*i*^f 


RING  FOR  NANCY 


She   was   standing  with  her  back  to   a   clrcssing-tabl( 


IING  FOR  NANCY 


R  (^MEDY 


FORDJMADOX  HUEFFER 

Author  o/ 

LADIES  WHOSH  BRIGHT  EYES.   KTC. 


ILLUSTRATED  BY 

F.  VAUX  WILSON 


INDI/  NAPOLIS 

THE  BOBBS-M    RRILL  COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


Copyright  1913 
The  Bobbs-Merrill  Company 


into 


PRESS    OF 

BRAUNWORTH   &    CO. 

BOOKBINDERS    AND    PRINTERS 

BROOKLYN,    N.   Y. 


# 


I 


DEDICATION 


Dear  Miss  Ada  Potter : 

Since  it  was  historic  tragedy  which,  as  you  might 
say,  brought  us  together,  accept  the  dedication  of  this 
very  unhistoric  comedy  for  which  you  are  so  largely 
responsible. 

Why  it  should  have  come  Into  your  head  to  inspire 
me  to  a  task  obviously  so  frivolous  and  one  which  will 
draw  down  upon  my  head  the  reprehensions  of  the  great 
and  serious,  and  the  stern  disapproval  of  eminent  and 
various  critics,  is  a  matter  that  lies  between  yourself  and 
your  conscience.  But  I  suppose,  in  this  odd,  frequently 
unpleasant  and  almost  always  much  too  serious  world, 
eveW'^a  person  so  earnest  as  yourself  feels  the  desire  to 
be  made  to  laugh  by  an  historian  so  obviously  earnest 
as  I  am. 

Accept  therefore  the  full  responsibilities  of  this  at- 
tempt to  satisfy  your  demand  in  the  spirit  which  dictates 
the  offer  and  believe  me. 

Your  humble,  obliged  and  obedient  servant, 

F.  M.  H. 


Maim 


^ 


3958 1'J 


RING  FOR  NANCY 


PART  I 


RING  FOR  nancy: 


TiJ-AJOR  EDWARD  BRENT  FOSTER,  the 
^^^  youngest  major  in  the  British  army,  was 
choosing  railway  Hterature  at  the  book-stall 
of  the  chief  departure  platform  of  the  terminus 
of  a  railway  company  that  ran  in  a  south- 
western direction  out  of  London.  He  had, 
under  one  arm,  a  whole  sheaf  of  illustrated 
journals.  For  these  he  had  not  yet  paid.  He 
was  looking  at  the  novels  that,  in  a  bright  col- 
ored wall,  rose  up  before  his  dim  eyes,  when 
his  tired  glance  wandered  toward  the  entrance 
from  the  booking  office.     He  exclaimed: 

"Oh,  my  aunt!"  For  he  had  a  sense  of  a 
lady  dressed,  as  he  perceived  out  of  the  corner 
of  his  eye,  in  pink  voile  with  an  emerald-green 
dust-cloak.  With  a  quick  glance  of  dismay, 
in  spite  of  his  short-sightedness,  he  had  recog- 
nized Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  a  by-now  obviously 
marriageable  widow,  with  whom,  during  the 
lifetime  of  her  late  husband,  he  had  been  quite 
innocently  almost  too  familiar.  He  thought, 
however,  that  he  had  managed  not  to  convey 

1 


2  RING  FOR  NANCY 

his  recognition  and  he  moved  swiftly  but  cir- 
curaspe.Gtly  down  the  platform.  He  kept,  in- 
deed, an  eye  over  his  shoulder  while  he  at- 
tempted to  hum  nonchalantly,  and  he  was 
aware  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  undoubtedly 
following  him.  He  walked  more  swiftly — un- 
der the  passenger  bridge,  past  another  railway 
book-stall,  past  the  railway  barber's  and  the 
railway  gimcrack  shop.  He  was,  indeed,  al- 
most in  the  passage  that  leads  to  the  south- 
eastern line,  and  he  was  wondering  if  he  would 
ever  be  able  to  stop  before  he  reached  Ton- 
bridge  or  even  Calais.  Then  he  ran  against  a 
quite  girlish  figure  in  very  white  muslins  who 
had  following  her  a  porter  burdened  with  four 
sorts  of  dressing-cases.     She  exclaimed: 

"Teddy  Brentr. 

And  Major  Brent  Foster  could  not  help 
ejaculating: 

"Oh,  my  uncle!"  since  these  relatives  were 
really  in  his  mind.  For  this  was  Miss  Flossie 
Delamare,  with  whom,  three  years  before,  he 
had  been  almost  more  familiar. 

She  was  fair  and  quite  happy,  and  if  her  feat- 
ures showed  traces  of  having  been  overpowdered 
professionally,  there  was  not  any  doubt  that  she 
still  had  a  complexion  to  lose.  And  she  was  so 
pleasantly  glad  to  see   him  that   Major   Brent 


RING  FOR  NANCY  3 

Foster  took  a  desperate  resolve.  He  had  slued 
round  to  face  her,  and  he  was  aware  out  of  the 
corner  of  his  eye  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was 
hovering  a  little  distance  away. 

"You've  got  to  save  me,  Flossie,"  he  said 
quickly  and  humorously.  "An  awful  past  is 
after  me.  I'm  not  Teddy  Brent  any  more,  and 
I  am  a  reformed  character." 

Miss  Delamare  took  on  a  slightly  injured — 
nay,  it  occurred  to  him  that  it  was  a  very  hurt 
air. 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  she  said,  "I'm  not  part  of 
your  awful  past !  If  you  don't  want  to  be  Teddy 
Brent  to  me,  you  can  be  the  Reverend  Jonas 
Whale,  though  it's  not  like  you,  Teddy." 

He  was  aware  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  brought 
up  by  this  conversation,  was  moving  regretfully 
back  to  the  main  line  platform. 

"Oh,  keep  talking,  Flossie,  darling!"  he  ex- 
claimed. "Keep  talking!  The  cloud's  rolling 
by!  I  am  a  reformed  character — but  it's  roll- 
ing by." 

"Teddy,"  she  said,  "I  don't  believe  you  need 
— that  you  ever  needed  to  be  a  reformed  char- 
acter.'* 

"Oh,  but  I  am,"  he  asseverated  with  an  air 
that  was  partly  earnest  and  partly  humorous. 
"I    don't    drink    when    anybody's    looking,    and 


4  RING  FOR  NANCY 

only  between  meals,  anyhow.  And  I  don't 
smoke  when  any  one  can  smell  it.  And  as  for 
.  .  .  that  sort  of  thing  .  .  ." 

She  said,  "Well.^"  interestedly. 

"Oh,  well,"  he  sighed,  "of  course,  there's 
Olympia — Olympia  Peabody  that  I'm  engaged 
to.    And  that  doesn't  leave  any  smell.     I  mean 

"You  mean,"  she  said,  "that  it  does  not  mat- 
ter— who's  looking  or  whether  it's  between 
meals  or  at  them.  And  it's  not  much  fun.  And 
we're  all  getting  older  and  wiser.  .  .  .  That  sort 
of  disagreeable  thing.  .  .  .  Now,  at  Simla  .  .  . 
at  Simla  .  .  ."  She  suddenly  turned  upon  her 
porter.  "Look  here,"  she  exclaimed,  "I  shall 
miss  my  train.  Go  and  put  my  things  in  a  first 
— an  empty  first  smoker.  I  want  to  be  alone. 
Tell  the  guard,  Miss  Flossie  Delamare." 

The  porter  said,  "Yes,  miss,"  and  lurched 
away  beneath  all  her  dressing-cases. 

"And  you  .  .  .  you're  as  famous  as  all  that?" 
he  asked. 

"As  all  what?"  she  said. 

"That  every  guard  knows  your  name?" 

"Oh,  is  that  all?"  she  said.  "Why,  every 
Anabaptist  minister  knows  my  name." 

Major  Brent  Foster  raised  his  eyebrows  in- 
terrogatively.    "Anabaptist?"  he  asked. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  5 

"Oh,  particularly !"  she  said.  "Fve  been  caus- 
ig  trouble  in  that  camp." 

Conscious  of  a  minute  pang  of  something  re- 

imbling  jealousy,  he  said:  "Of  course,  you 
would  cause  trouble  in  that  camp.  Now,  I've 
got  an  uncle  who's  an  Anabaptist — a  Post  Ana- 
baptist. .  .  ." 

"My  old  Johnnie's  a  Post  Anabaptist,  too," 
Miss  Delamare  said. 

"Well,  that's  all  right,  that's  all  right,"  Major 
Brent  Foster  exclaimed  touchily.  "Those  are 
your  private  affairs.  I've  got  to  catch  my 
train,"  and  he  moved  off  toward  the  platform. 
She  walked  beside  him. 

"You  know,  Teddy,"  she  said  rather  plain- 
tively, "you're  very  funny  to-day.  You're  not 
a  bit  like  your  old  Irish  self.  You're  not  a  bit 
even  like  a  gentleman." 

"Oh,  hang  it  all!"  he  exclaimed.  "No,  I'm 
not  a  bit  like  my  old  Irish  self.  I'm  not  even 
a  gentleman.  I  tell  you  I'm  a  reformed  char- 
acter." 

She  opened  resignedly  her  immense  reticule, 
which  was  made  of  brown  canvas  sewn  over 
with  silver  lace,  black  pearls  and  red  coral. 
She  produced  a  large  white  card. 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  she  said,  "here's  my  ad- 
dress.    Come  and  see  me  one  day  next  week." 


6  RING  FOR  NANCY 

He  gave  a  start  back  as  if  the  card  had  been 
red-hot. 

"My  God,  no!'*  he  exclaimed.  "I  shall  be  in 
the  country  all  next  week.  I  never  call  on  any- 
body. I  shut  myself  up.  I  work,  I  tell  you.  I 
read  the  complete  works  of  Henry  James. 
That's  why  I'm  the  youngest  major  in  the  Brit- 
ish army." 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  she  said,  "you're  very 
funny.  Almost  as  funny  as  you  used  to  be  in 
the  old  days.  Only  in  another  way.  Don't 
you  remember  Simla  .  .  .  and  the  pucka 
drives?  .  .  .  Don't  look  so  miserable!  Pm  not 
your  awful  past.  I'm  not  going  to  upset  Miss 
Olympia  Peabody.  I  guess  that's  your  awful 
past  waiting  for  you  under  the  foot-bridge." 

He  gave  an  agitated  glance  toward  those 
shadows.  Sure  enough,  though  to  him  she  was 
nothing  but  a  blur  of  gay  colors,  beneath  the 
foot-bridge,  there  was  the  emerald-green  tulle 
dust-cloak  and  the  immense  black  hat  with  the 
pink  roses  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe. 

Major  Brent  Foster  clutched  the  wrist  of 
Miss  Delamare. 

"Oh,  stop  with  me,  Flossie,"  he  said;  "stop 
with  me!  She  won't  come  near  me  while  you 
are   here." 

"I'll  stop  with  you,"  she  said.     "I'll  stop  with 


RING  FOR  NANCY  7 

you  as  long  as  you  like,  old  boy.  That's  to 
say,  I'm  traveling  by  the  six  forty-eight,  so  I 
shall  have  to  leave  you  and  cut  at  six  forty- 
six." 

"I'm  traveling  by  the  six  forty-eight,  too,"  he 
answered;  and  then  he  exclaimed:  "Look  here, 
Flossie,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  isn't  really  my  awful 
past.  I  haven't  got  an  awful  past  at  all.  Only 
a  damned  beastly  unpleasant  past.  Dust  and 
ashes — that's  what  has  crocked  up  my  poor 
eyes — and  alkali  wells   in  Somaliland." 

Miss  Delamare  said  rather  viciously:  "Oh, 
we  always  knew,  even  in  Simla,  that  it  had  got 
its  little  girl  waiting  for  it  with  trusting  eyes 
in  a  little  parsonage.  But  we  didn't  know  that 
its  little  girl's  little  name  was  Olymnia.  I 
shouldn't  care  to  waste  twelve  years — not  for 
an  Olympia.  I'd  have  my  little  horse  show  in 
between  the  big  meetings." 

"I  don't  in  the  least  understand  you,"  Major 
Brent  Foster  said. 

"Of  course,  you  wouldn't!"  she  said.  "Being 
so  long  out  of  England  and  studying;  for  the 
staff  college  exam,  and  all." 

"What  I  want  you  to  understand,"  he  an- 
swered, "is  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  is  not  an  aw- 
ful past.  She's  just  a  burr.  She's  a  sticker. 
That's  what  she  is.     And  as  she  is  got  up  in 


8  RING  FOR  NANCY 

pink  and  green,  and  her  husband's  been  dead 
eighteen  months,  it's  a  sign  that  she's  danger- 
ous." 

"Well,  I  seem  to  be  dangerous,  too,"  Miss 
Delamare  said  plaintively. 

"Oh,  you're  dangerous  in  another  way,"  Ma- 
ijor  Brent  Foster  said  earnestly.  "Don't  you 
see,  she's  a  black  draft:  you're  a  little  spoon- 
ful of  jam.  That's  the  difference.  She's  re- 
morse: you're  temptation.  That's  the  differ- 
ence,  too."  I 

"Well,  now,  Teddy,  that's  decent  of  you,"  she 
said.  "I'll  forgive  you  miles  and  miles  for  that 
■■ — and  leave  you  to  your  Olympia." 

She  looked  up  the  platform;  they  were  stand- 
ing in  front  of  the  other  book-stall,  just  near 
the  gimcrack  shop. 

"Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,"  she  said,  "seems  to  have 
given  up  the  game,  so  I  can  go  and  find  my 
seat.  Of  course,  it's  a  privilege  to  have  been 
allowed  to  gaze  on  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  even  from 
a  distance." 

"Why  the  devil  should  it  be?"  he  asked.  i 

"Well,  you  did  entertain  angels  unawares — 
in  Simla,"  she  mocked  at  him.  "There  you 
had  me — and  ain't  I  the  top  notch  of  musical 
comedy?  And  there  you  had  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe, 
and  isn't  she  the  greatest  and  most  popular 
novelist  the  world  has  even  seen?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  9 

"I  didn't  know,"  Major  Brent  Foster  said  in- 
nocently;  "but,  of  course,  I'm  awfully  glad, 
Flossie.  You  used  to  be  rather  a  starved  little 
rat — in  Simla." 
I  "So  I  was,  Teddy,"  she  said,  "and  you  were 
pretty  good  to  me.  I  shan't  forget  it.  Good- 
by,  old  Teddy.  I  expect  you'll  be  a  sidesman 
and  take  round  the  plate  before  we  meet 
again." 

She  moved  away  up  the  platform,  and  Major 
Brent  Foster  remained  looking  at  the  book- 
stall. The  name  "Juliana  Kerr  Howe"  met  his 
eye  at  least  twenty-seven  times.  There  was 
Pink  Passion,  by  Juliana  Kerr  Howe,  with  the 
picture  of  a  lady  in  a  pink  nightgown.  There 
was  All  for  Love,  by  Juliana  Kerr  Howe,  with 
the  gilt  design  of  a  pierced  heart  and  a  broken 
globe  on  the  cover.  There  was  a  lady's  weekly 
periodical  with  the  inscription  in  purple  let- 
ters, ''The  Lonely  Girl.  Read  about  her  in- 
side.    By  Juliana  Kerr  Howe." 

Major  Brent  Foster  exclaimed,  "My  God!" 
in  an  appalled  manner.  Then  he  suddenly  at- 
tacked the  small  boy  who  was  sitting  behind 
the   stall. 

"Do  you  mean  to  say,"  he  said,  and  in  his 
agitation  the  trace  of  an  Irish  accent  became 
audible  in  his  voice,  "do  you  mean  to  say  that 
you  haven't  got  a  single  book  of  James'?" 


10  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Never  heard  the  name/'  the  book-stall  boy- 
said.  *'But  there's  plenty  of  novels  by  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe." 

*That  kelch!"  Major  Foster  exclaimed.  "I 
tell  you,  it  was  reading  the  books  of  James 
that  made  me  the  youngest  major  in  the  Brit- 
ish army.     You  tell  all  your  customers  that." 

And  then  extraordinary  things  happened  to 
Major  Brent  Foster.  It  began  with  the  soft 
crawling  voice  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  that  ex- 
claimed at  his  elbow: 

"Captain  Edward  Brent!" 

He  spun  round  and  exclaimed:  "Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe,  by  all  that's  wonderful!  I  was  just  buy- 
ing all  your  books !" 

And  almost  simultaneously  he  heard  from 
behind  his  back  the  voice  of  Miss  Flossie  Dela- 
mare  saying  plaintively,  "Teddy,  dear,  there's 
something  I  want  to  say  to  you.  I  don't  want 
you  to  think  I  am  any  worse  than  I  am." 

There  was  also  the  gruff  voice  of  the  clerk 
at   the   first   book-stall   remarking: 

"You  haven't  paid  for  them  magazines." 

Major  Brent  Foster  spun  round  on  his  heel 
once  more.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  walked  frostily 
up  the  platform,  and  Miss  Delamare  gazed 
after  her  with  spiteful  glee. 

"I'm  watching  over  you,  Teddy,  all  right!" 
she  laughed.     "I  watched  that  cat  of  a  woman. 


"Q^f   go   away!"   Major   Brent  Fosici    exclaimed 


RING  FOR  NANCY  11 

She  was  hiding  on  the  other  side  of  the  steps 
of  the  bridge.  And  the  moment  she  saw  me 
leave  you  she  sailed  down.  Did  you  see  her 
draw  her  skirts  together  as  I  came  up?  She 
was  afraid  I  was  going  to  defile  her.  Her! 
Who  writes  books  called  A  Maid  and  No  Maid, 
I  should  be  ashamed!" 

"You're  a  regular  brick/'  Major  Foster  ex- 
claimed. They  had  walked  a  little  way  from 
the  book-stall.  The  voice  of  the  first  clerk 
came  in  a  sort  of  chorus: 

"You  haven't  paid  for  them  magazines. 
Three  and  fourpence." 

"Not  but  what,"  Miss  Delamare  continued, 
"I  wasn't  speaking  the  truth  when  I  said  that  I 
had  something  to  tell  you.  It's  true  that  I 
don't  want  to  let  you  think  that  I  am  worse 
than  I  am.  Now  this  old  Johnnie — this  Ana- 
baptist that  I  was  speaking  of.  I  don't  want 
you  to  think — to  think  that  I'm  .  .  ." — she 
brought  it  out — "living  with  him." 

"Three  and  fourpence,"  the  book-stall  clerk 
remarked.  "You  come  to  my  stall  and  you 
took  three  and  fourpence  worth  of  papers  and 
you  never  paid  for  them." 

"Oh,  go  away!"  Major  Brent  Foster  ex- 
claimed, and  he  pushed  his  elbow  into  the 
book-stall  clerk's  chest.  He  continued  to  Miss 
Delamare: 


12  RING  FOR  NANCY  . 

"I'm  awfully  glad  to  hear  it,  old  girl.  I  al- 
ways warned  you  against  that  sort  of  thing. 
It  doesn't  pay!" 

"If  you  don't  pay  that  three  and  fourpence 
.  .  ."  the  clerk  chimed  in. 

"It's  like  this,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said 
in  a  sort  of  whisper  of  confession.  And  then 
she  suddenly  raised  her  voice  quite  high. 
"Aren't  you  going  to  kiss  me,  Teddy?"  she 
exclaimed.  "Not  a  good-by  kiss  if  we  part 
forever?"  Her  voice  was  a  fine  wail.  But  this 
itime  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  who  had  returned,  was 
not  to  be  driven  off. 

"I  only  want  to  tell  Captain  Brent,"  she  said 
in  her  sweetest  and  most  crawling  tones,  "that 
I  shall  be  in  the  special  carriage  that  his  uncle 
has  reserved  for  his  guests.  There  is  only  five 
minutes  before  the  train  starts." 

"I'll  come  and  find  you,"  Major  Brent  Foster 
said.     "I  just  want  a  word  with  my  sister." 

Mrs.   Kerr  Howe  answered  meaningly: 

"Then  I  won't  intrude."  She  added,  "A 
tantotf'  languishing,  and  really  went  away. 

The  book-stall  clerk  remarked:  "I  shall  have 
to  fetch  an  ofBcer." 

Major  Brent  Foster  burst  into  the  most  vio- 
lent oaths. 

"That  woman!"  he  screamed,  "going  to  my 


•RING  FOR  NANCY  13 

uncle's!  In  the  same  carriage  with  me!  How 
does  she  know  my  uncle?  How  does  she  know 
I've  got  an  uncle?" 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said, 
"every  one's  got  an  uncle.  Even  I've  got  one 
real  one.  And  there  are  hundreds  of  Johnnies 
who  have  offered  to  be  uncles  to  me.  But  I've 
done  my  best  for  you.  You'll  have  to  see  it 
through  now.  And  what  I  wanted  to  explain 
is  this  .  .  ." 

"I'm  going  to  fetch  an  officer  now,"  the 
book-stall  clerk  exclaimed,  and  he  went  away. 

"You  know,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said, 
"you'd  better  pay  that  man." 

Major  Brent  Foster  exclaimed  violently: 
"Oh,  hell!"  Then  he  fumbled  in  his  waist- 
coat pocket  and  pitched  half  a  sovereign  on  to 
the  book-stall.  After  the  half-sovereign  he 
pitched  the  papers  themselves.  The  boy  began 
to  scramble  among  his  literature  for  his  coin. 

"Now,  that's  like  the  old  dear  Teddy,"  Miss 
Delamare  said.  He  had  hooked  his  hand  into 
her  arm  and  was  drawing  her  away  up  the 
platform.  "That's  more  like  you — to  chuck 
away  half  a  sov.  and  not  to  wait  for  the 
change." 

"I'm  ruined,  anyhow,  if  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  is 
going  to  my  uncle's,"  he  answered  vindictively. 


14  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Poor  old  Teddy!"  Miss  Delamare  said  with 
a  note  of  commiseration.  And  then  she  con- 
tinued swiftly:  "But  what  I  wanted  to  tell  you 
was  this — about  how  I  came  to  get  in  with 
those  people.  You  know,  somewhere  up  in  the 
north  of  London  there  are  a  lot  of  rich  Non- 
conformists. People  with  hothouses  and 
peaches,  and  being  aldermen  and  so  on.  And 
I've  got  a  chum — Lottie  Charles.  And  Lottie 
Charles  was  precious  down  on  her  luck,  and 
the  North  London  Congregations  had  started 
a  Society  for  the  Reform  of  the  Stage.  And 
Lottie,  as  she  couldn't  get  anything  in  the 
world  to  do,  used  to  walk  before  them  once  a 
week  as  an  awful  example — you  know  the  sort 
of  thing. 

"So  one  day  Lottie  Charles  came  to  me, 
and  she  says  it  would  be  doing  her  no  end  of 
a  good  turn  if  I  would  come  and  pose,  too. 
Well,  of  course,  I've  nothing  against  doing  any- 
thing in  the  world  to  oblige  an  old  chum.  She 
and  me  were  on  the  old  North  Circuit.  Roomed 
it  and  ate  off  the  same  old  red  herring  together. 
So,  of  course,  I  said  I'd  do  it.  But  it  did  not 
suit  me  to  be  wept  over  and  pawed  by  a  lot  of 
Nonconformists,  so  I  said  I'd  read  them  a  lec- 
ture on  The  Real  Reform  of  the  Stage.  Of 
course,  I  don't  know  anything  about  reforms; 


RING  FOR  NANCY  15 

the   stage   is   all  right  as  long  as  you're   jolly 
well   on   the    top. 

**But  IVe  got  another  pal — Robin,  his  name 
is — a  dramatic  critic.  Awful  prim  and  respect- 
able chap;  always  with  an  umbrella.  But  he 
writes  articles  about  me  that  bring  the  tears 
to  your  eyes;  he  says  I'm  the  symphonic  em- 
bodiment of  quaint  imbecility,  and  as  such 
have  my  worth.  I  learned  the  words  by  heart, 
though  what  they  mean  passes  me.  So  up  I 
goes  to  Robin  on  the  first  night  of  Pigs  is  Pigs, 
and  I  just  asked  him  point-blank  to  write  the 
lecture  for  me — on  the  real  reform  of  the 
stage.  And,  tvhat's  more,  he  did  it.  So  I 
learned  it  by  heart,  and  I  just  slung  it  at 
those  Johnnies.  My!  you  should  have  heard 
me.  Cheer?  I  don't  think!  Cry  at  the  pa- 
thetic passages?  Not  half  they  did  not.  .  .  . 
But  it  was  the  fine  lecture  and  all.  The  stage! 
The  stage  was  to  regenerate  the  people's  mor- 
als. It  was  to  replace  the  old  pulpit.  It  was 
to  fill  the  minds  of  the  unthinking  with  thought ! 
My  goodness  me,  I  never  heard  such  talk! 
But  I  slung  it  at  them  in  a  sort  of  awful 
mournful  voice,  like  Mrs.  Pat's.  You  know! 
.  .  .  And  the  end  of  it  is  that  the  old  chap 
who  was  the  chairman,  and  a  millionaire,  and 
a  Common  Councilman — that  old  chap  is  never 


16  RING  FOR  NANCY 

out  of  my  diggings.  And  his  missus,  too,  you 
understand.  There's  nothing  underhand  about 
it.  His  missus  likes  me  as  much  as  he  does, 
and  more.  Like  a  mother  she  is.  And  I'm  go- 
ing down  now  to  stop  at  their  country  house. 
.  .  .  But  the  long  and  short  of  it  is  that  the 
old  chap  is  building  a  theater  for  me.  And 
we're  going  to  put  on  the  weirdest  sort  of  old 
reforming  plays.  And  I've  got  a  ten  years' 
contract,  and  that  critic  man  is  to  be  general 
•manager.  So  I'm  provided  for,  Teddy,  old  boy. 
It's  a  funny  world." 


II 

TiyrAJOR  BRENT  FOSTER  was  not,  how- 
^^^  ever,  paying  much  attention  to  his  com- 
panion. As  they  approached  the  train  he  ob- 
served Miss  Delamare's  porter  standing  at 
the  door  of  one  first-class  carriage.  At  the 
door  of  the  next  was  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  and  the 
compartment  beside  which  she  stood  was  la- 
beled "Reserved."  The  book-stall  clerk  was 
speaking  to  a  railway  policeman  at  the  door  of 
the  booking  office.  Miss  Delamare  walked 
straight  to  the  door  of  her  compartment;  she 
held  out  her  peachy  pink  cheek,  and  remarked: 

"Ain't  you  really  going  to  kiss  me,  Teddy — 
for  old  time's  sake?"  And  there  was  such  a 
plaintive  tone  in  her  voice  that,  with  a  fierce 
determination,  he  stretched  out  his  lips.  But 
she  just  laughed  and  jumped  into  her  carriage. 

"Keep  it  for  the  horse  show,"  she  said. 

He  was  by  now  in  a  temper  that  made  him 
ready  to  face  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  and  half  a  dozen 
devils,  so  that  he  marched  straight  upon  the 
reserved  compartment.  But  again  his  heart 
failed.    He  was  ready  to  face  the  lady  and  sev- 


17 


18  RING  FOR  NANCY 

eral  devils.  Facing  her  alone  was  another  mat- 
ter.    And  the  compartment  was  empty! 

At  that  moment  he  perceived  a  rather  dia- 
bolical-looking old  gentleman  in  a  fur  coat, 
though  it  was  June,  and  a  soft,  curious  felt  hat. 
The  old  gentleman,  accompanied  by  a  guard 
and  a  porter,  was  obviously  looking  for  a  first- 
class  carriage.  And  Major  Brent  Foster 
chanced  his  luck.  He  did  not  know  the  old 
gentleman  from  Adam,  but  he  exclaimed: 

"Come  along,  Sir  Arthur.  Glad  to  see  you. 
Get  in  here,  and  let's  travel  together.  It's  a 
long  time  since  we  met." 

The  old  gentleman  seemed  haughtily  puz- 
zled. But  the  carriage  was  comfortably  empty, 
and  the  major  had  already  pushed  in  the  por- 
ter, bags  and  all.  And  immediately  he  was  in 
the  midst  of  a  scene.  There  was  Miss  Dela- 
mare  laughing  out  of  her  window.  There  was 
the  guard  with  his  flag,  lingering,  as  if  to  give 
the  finishing  touches  to  his  train.  There  was 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  just  getting  in.  And  then 
suddenly  the  voice  of  the  book-stall  clerk  ex- 
claimed: 

"OfBcer,  arrest  that  man  for  theft." 

Major  Brent  Foster  got  into  the  carriage, 
and  treading  on  the  old  gentleman's  toes  as 
he   turned,   exclaimed: 


9 


I  RING  FOR  NANCY  19 

"Go  away!     I  haven't  got  your  magazines." 

"You've  disposed  of  them  to  an  accomplice," 
the  book-stall  clerk  cried  out. 

"I  paid  half  a  sovereign  for  them,"  the 
major  exclaimed  good-naturedly. 

"Not  at  my  stall,"  the  clerk  said. 

"No,  of  course  not,"  the  major  said.  "I 
never  do  pay  at  the  stall  v^here  I  buy  them. 
It's  the  only  way  to  keep  a  check  on  you  fel- 
lows.    I'm  a  shareholder." 

The  guard  suggested  that  it  was  time;  the 
railway  policeman,  who  had  said  that  he  had 
no  powers  to  arrest,  suggested  that  the  gentle- 
man might  leave  his  name  and  address.  The 
major  called  out:  "Major  Brent  I^oster,  the 
Manor,  Basildon,  Hants,"  and  the  train  moved 
on.  The  major  sank  down  in  the  seat  opposite 
the  old  gentleman,  and  exclaimed:  "What  a 
day!"  \, 

Almost  at  the  same  moment  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
exclaimed:  "So  you've  changed  your  name, 
Teddy." 

And  the  old  man  said  violently:  "Who  are 
you,  sir?  I  don't  know  your  name,  sir!  What 
is  the  meaning  of  this  outrage?" 

"Of  course,  I  changed  my  name,"  the  major 
explained  first  to  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  "My  old 
name  wasn't  popular.     It  stunk  in  my  uncle's 


20  .  RING  FOR  NANCY 

nostrils.  I  changed  it  on  the  day  I  was  engaged 
to  Olympia."  Then  he  turned  mildly  on  the 
old  gentleman.  "That's  probably  why  you  do 
not  recognize  my  name.  I  used  to  be  called 
Edward  Brent." 

"Fm  not  a  connoisseur  of  unsavory  names," 
the  old  gentleman  said  bitterly.  *T  presume 
you're  a  groom?" 

"Now  I  don't  see  why  you  should  presume 
that,"  the  major  said. 

"You  say  you're  engaged  at  Olympia,"  the 
old  man  said.  "I  can  not  imagine  any  one  but 
grooms  being  engaged  there." 

The  major  exclaimed,  "Oh!"  And  then  he 
said,  "That's  what  you  all  mean.  The  fact  is, 
I've  been  out  of  England  for  so  long — put  away, 
as  you  might  say,  and  working  like  a  nigger  to 
get  through — that  I  can't  be  expected  to  recog- 
nize these  topical  matters.  Of  course,  Olympia 
is  a  horse  show.  That's  what  Flossie  meant!" 
He  looked  at  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  as  if  for  confirm- 
ation, and  then  he  added,  "Of  course,  Sir 
Arthur,  I  said  I  was  engaged  not  at,  but  to, 
Olympia — Miss  Olympia  Peabody,  of  Boston 
State  Reformatory." 

The  old  gentleman  positively  shivered. 

"I'm  not  losing  my  nerve,"  he  said,  "I  never 
lost  my  nerve  in  my  life,  but  all  this  has  a  very 


RING  FOR  NANCY  21 

criminal  sound.  Be  good  enough  to  explain,  or 
I  shall  certainly  pull  the  alarm  cord." 

"But,  my  dear  Sir  Arthur  .  .  "  Major  Brent 
Foster  exclaimed. 

"How  do  you  know  my  name?"  the  old 
gentleman  asked  sharply.  He  had  a  very  hale 
and  hearty  face,  with  red  cheek-bones,  a  white 
beard,  a  savage  black  mustache  and  savage 
black  eyebrows. 

"As  if  I  did  not  know  your  face,"  the  major 
said,  and  he  wondered  amiably  who  the  old 
gentleman  could  be  in  the  world.  "Wasn't 
your  photograph  on  the  study  desk  of  my  best 
chum  Toppy  at  Harrow?" 

"It  certainly  wasn't,"  the  old  gentleman  said. 
"I  do  not  know  any  individual  of  the  name  of 
Toppy.  You  trepan  me  into  the  compartment 
of  yourself  and  your  female  companion.  The 
first  thing  I  hear  is  that  you  are  accused  of 
theft.  You  stamp  upon  my  toes,  and  announce 
that  you  have  changed  your  name  because  it  is 
unsavory  to  your  relatives.  You  certainly  ap- 
pear to  know  my  name.  But  there  is  nothing 
astonishing  about  that,  for  in  these  curiosity- 
mongering  times  my  face  is  constantly  appear- 
ing in  the  public  press." 

"Oh,  I  say,"  Major  Brent  Foster  said  guile- 
lessly, "there's  nothing  curious  about  your  face. 


22  RING  FOR  NANCY 

It's  rather  a  fine  face,  if  you'll  excuse  my  saying 
so. 

Major  Brent  Foster  was  upon  the  whole 
happy,  for  the  longer  he  could  keep  up  any 
sort  of  talk  with  this  mysterious  Sir  Arthur,  the 
longer  he  could  stave  off  a  private  explanation 
with  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  Sir  Arthur  blushed  with 
fury,  and  his  eyes  positively  sparkled. 

"I  did  not  mean,"  he  said,  "that  my  face  is 
a  curiosity,  as  if  it  were,  what  I  believe  it  is  the 
custom  to  call,  a  freak.  I  meant  that,  as  I  enjoy 
a  certain  celebrity,  my  face  is  frequently  repro- 
duced in  the  press." 

"But  that  only  means,"  Major  Brent  Foster 
said  amiably,  "that  the  press  is  doing  its  duty. 
It  inspirits  us  nobodies  to  know  what  our  lead- 
ers look  like." 

Sir  Arthur  appeared  modified  in  his  course 
of  rage. 

"Understand  me,"  he  said,  "if  the  press  con- 
fined itself  to  the  portrayal  of  leaders  of  thought, 
there  would  be  little  to  complain  of." 

"Now  that  was  what  I  was  just  saying  to 
my  little  friend,  Miss  Flossie  Delamare,"  the 
major  invented  boldly.  "She  is  in  the  next  com- 
partment because  she  was  too  shy  to  come  into 
such  distinguished  society  as  that  of  you  and 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  23 

The  old  gentleman  raised  both  his  hands  in  an 
attitude  of  tragic  horror;  but  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
said  eagerly: 

*'You're  such  a  consummate  liar,  Teddy,  that 
there^s  never  a  chance  to  know  what  you  do 
mean.  But  if  that  was  Miss  Flossie  Delamare, 
why  in  the  world  did  you  not  bring  her  in 
here?" 

The  major  did  not  in  the  least  understand 
where  he  was  getting  to. 

"I  don't  see  why  a  great  writer  like  you 
should  want  to  know  a  poor  little  thing  like 
Flossie,"  he  said.  "But,  at  any  rate,  she  was 
too  modest.     She's  a  retiring  little  thing." 

*'You  said  she  was  your  sister,"  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  remarked  sweetly. 

"So  she  is,"  the  major  said  pleasantly;  "a 
sort  of  half-sister.  Only,  of  course,  it's  a  pain- 
ful subject,  and  it  would  not  be  quite  kind  to 
mention  it,  you  understand.  You  understand. 
But  still,  she's  my  oldest  woman  friend." 

"It's  strange  you  never  mentioned  her  at 
Simla,"  Mrs.  Howe  said.  "Don't  you  remember 
Simla  and  the  pucka  drives?  And  you  never 
once  mentioned  her  name." 

"Of  course,  I  should  not,"  the  major  said; 
"that's  only  her  stage  name.  Besides,  at  that 
time  we  had  quarreled.    I  should  not  have  been 


-H 


O 


24  RING  FOR  NANCY 

likely  to  mention  her  name.  It  was  a  deadly 
quarrel — about  her  being  on  the  stage." 

*'I  suppose  it  was  the  same  old  quarrel  going 
on  just  now?"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  asked. 

"But  we  weren't  quarreling,"  the  major  an- 
swered. *'We're  the  best  of  friends.  If  I  were 
not  going  to  marry  Olympia,  I  don't  see  that  I 
could  do  better  than  marry  Flossie." 

"Your  half-sister!"     Mrs.   Howe  uttered. 

"You're  awfully  unimaginative  for  a  writer," 
the  major  said.  "What  I  mean  is  that  if  I  were 
not  going  to  marry  Olympia,  I  should  have 
little  Flossie  to  keep  house  for  me.  She's  the 
best  and  kind-heartedest  and  stanchest  little  thing 
in  the  world.     That's  how  I  feel." 

"And  I'm  sure,"  Mrs.  Howe  said,  "it  does 
your  fraternal  feelings  credit.  But  that  does  not 
explain  how  you  come  to  be  parting  for  good. 
For  I  heard  her  ask  you  to  kiss  her  for  that 
reason." 

"Oh,  you're  a  perfect  fool  sometimes,  my  dear 
Juliana,"  the  major  said.  "Of  course  we  are  on 
the  best  terms  in  the  world.  And  of  course  we 
have  to  part  for  good.  It  explains  itself.  How 
can  I  have  an  unexplained  half-sister  going 
about  with  me  when  I  am  going  to  marry 
Olympia?  It's  a  ridiculous  idea.  Think  of  the 
discredit  it  would  cast  on  my  family." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  25 

Sir  Arthur  began  suddenly  to  speak,  and  the 
major  heaved  a  sigh  of  relief.  He  would  just  as 
soon — being  Irish ! — lie  as  not.  But  Mrs.  Howe 
was  a  little  w^earying. 

"My  young  friend,"  the  old  man  said,  "I  begin 
to  understand  that  you  are  not,  as  I  at  first  con- 
sidered you,  a  criminal.  You  stand  up  for  your 
humble  relation  in  a  way  that  is  quite  creditable 
in  this  immoral  and  thoughtless  age.  But  you 
will  oblige  me  by  kindly  explaining  where  you 
have  met  me  before,  and  who  Toppy  is — the 
gentleman  who  used  to  have  my  likeness  on 
his  desk." 

Major  Brent  Foster  heaved  a  deep  sigh. 

"I  used  to  meet  you  at  the  admiral's  balls  at 
Portsmouth,"  he  said  succinctly,  "and  Toppy 
was  the  nickname  of  your  son  Arthur  at  Har- 
row.    He  was  my  room-mate." 

"And  pray  who  am  I,  then?"  Sir  Arthur 
asked. 

"You !"  the  major  said  guilelessly.  "You  are 
Rear-admiral  Sir  Arthur  Bowles."  The  old 
gentleman  had  such  a  martial  air  that  the  major 
thought  he  was  safe  to  put  him  in  one  or  the 
other  of  the  services — more  probably  in  the 
navy,  because  of  his  beard.  The  old  gentleman 
raised  both  of  his  hands   to  heaven. 

"I,"  he  said,  "I  am  Sir  Arthur  Johnson,  the 


26  RING  FOR  NANCY 

president  of  the  First  Church  of  Christ  Quietist 
in  London." 

"Well,  it's  a  most  extraordinary  world  I've 
come  back  to,"  the  major  sighed.  "Everybody 
I  have  met  since  I  left  Somaliland,  is  a  reformer 
of  something.  There's  Olympia.  She's  the  hon- 
orary secretary  of  the  Massachusetts  Reforma- 
tory, and  perpetual  grand  mistress  of  the  Bos- 
ton Society  for  the  Abolition  of  Vice.  There's 
my  aunt  that  I'm  going  to,  dear  old  soul,  who 
knows  about  as  much  of  evil  as  an  egg  knows 
of  aeroplanes,  and  she's  the  secretary  of  the 
Society  for  the  Suppression  of  Sin.  Now  what 
are  you  reforming,  Juliana?" 

"I?"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said.  "I  am  the  presi- 
dent of  the  Society  for  Abolishing  Conventional 
Marriage." 

"My  God!"  the  major  said,  "I  guess  you're 
cut  out  for  the  part.  But  I'm  hanged  if  the 
only  person  that  I  know  that  isn't  the  president 
of  something  or  other  isn't  my  old  humbug  of 
an  uncle,  and  yet  you'd  say  he  was  just  cut  out 
for  the  part.  Why  even  Flossie,  little  Flossie, 
is  something  of  the  sort.  She's  the  only  woman 
on  the  stage  who  looks  anything  than  a  stuffed 
fiddle  in  tights — and  she's  going  to  be  the  first 
manager  of  a  show  for  the  reform  of  the  the-^ 


RING  FOR  NANCY  27 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  leaned  forward  from  her 
corner  to  say  as  clearly  as  possible: 

''It's  your  uncle  who  is  the  founder  of  the 
National  Society  for  Theater  Reform.  It's  he 
who  is  going  to  build  the  theater  for  Miss  Dela- 
mare." 

The  major  sank  down  in  his  seat,  all  crumpled 
together  as  if  he  had  fallen  from  a  great  height. 

*7ust  heaven!"  he  said:  "then  my  uncle  and 
aunt  are  the  respectable  couple  that  Flossie  said 
she  was  going  to  visit.  Then  she's  travehng 
down  with  us.  She  ought  to  have  been  in  this 
carriage." 

"I  wish  she  had  been,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said 
sweetly.  *T  most  particularly  want  to  talk  to 
her." 

"More  than  you  want  to  talk  to  me?"  the 
major  asked. 

"Oh,  of  course,  I  shall  have  to  have  an  ex- 
planation with  you  before  the  day  is  out,"  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  said  grimly.  "I  certainly  intend  to 
have  one.  But  I  want  a  regular — what  you 
might  call — heart  talk  with  Miss  Delamare  be- 
fore she  gets  down  to  your  uncle." 

"About" — the  major  rather  gasped — "about 
things  r' 

"Of  course,  about  things,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
said;  "about  the  most  important  things  in  the 


28  RING  FOR  NANCY 

world.  I  want  to  point  out  to  Miss  Delamare 
that  you  can't  reform  the  theater  without  re- 
forming the  conventional  idea  about  marriage. 
I  want  a  play  I've  written  to  be  the  very  first 
that  she  puts  on  at  the  Reformed  Theater.  This 
is  not  self-seeking  on  my  part — it's  the  most  im- 
portant thing  in  the  world,  the  reform  of  con- 
ventional  marriage." 

"Oh,  I  see,"  the  major  said  amiably,  "you 
want  to  nobble  her  before  she  makes  any  busi- 
ness arrangements  with  my  uncle."  He  paused 
and  remained  lost  in  thought.  But  Sir  Arthur 
Johnson  was  anxious  to  explain  his  position. 

"I  am  anxious  to  explain  my  position,"  he 
said,  "so  that  there  may  not  be  any  mistake 
about  it." 

"I  am  sure  it  will  be  extremely  interesting," 
the  major  said  politely. 

"I  am  not  in  the  habit,"  the  president  of  the 
Quietist  Church  continued,  "of  entering  into 
conversation  with  strangers  in  a  railway  car- 
riage. I  never  lose  my  temper — that  is  the 
great  lesson  that  Quietism  teaches  us.  No,  I 
never  lose  my  temper.  But  when  you  stamped 
very  hard  upon  my  toes,  that,  I  must  confess, 
induced  in  me  what  we  are  accustomed  to  call 
a  marked  quickening  of  ideas.  That,  you  see,  is 
quite  different  from  losing  one's  temper.     From 


RING  FOR  NANCY  29 

the  fact  that  you  have  dragged  me  into  this  car- 
riage, stamped  upon  my  toes,  mentioned  that 
you  have  changed  a  discreditable  name  and  had, 
what  I  took  to  be,  an  engagement  in  a  place 
frequented  by  grooms,  horsey  people  and  the 
criminal  classes  generally — from  all  these  facts 
together  I  imagined  that  you  yourself  were 
either  a  groom  or  a  member  of  a  horsey  and 
criminal  class.  I  imagined  that,  knowing  that  I 
was  the  head  of  an  advanced  and  wealthy  body, 
you  imagined  that  I  carried  about  with  me  in 
my  hand-baggage,  which  you  had  observed  to 
be  very  heavy,  the  funds  of  the  church  of  which 
I  am  the  head." 

*'So  that  there  we  all,  in  a  manner  of  speak- 
ing, are,"  the  major  astonishingly  remarked. 

"I  don't  take  you,"  Sir  Arthur  said  frostily. 

"Oh,  that's  a  way  I've  got,"  the  major  said, 
"from  studying  the  works  of  Henry  James.  His 
characters  are  perpetually  remarking  *so  that 
there,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  we  are.'  And, 
of  course,  as  you  can  never  make  out  where 
they  are,  it's  extraordinarily  strengthening  to 
the  brain  to  work  it  out.  That's  why  I'm  the 
youngest  major  in  the  British  army." 

"I  don't  see  what  all  that  has  to  do  with  me," 
Sir  Arthur  said  frostily.  "What  I  have  to  do  is 
to  make  my  position  quite  plain  to  you.     When 


30  RING  FOR  NANCY 

I  considered  that  you  and  your  female  com- 
panion were  dangerous  criminals  intent  on  steal- 
ing from  me  the  contents  of  my  very  heavy  lug- 
gage, I  at  once  matured  a  plan.  That  is  one  of 
the  great  benefits  of  Quietism  that,  instead  of 
letting  your  thoughts  waste  themselves  on  use- 
less anger,  they  are  quickened.  I  immediately 
matured  a  plan.  I  said  to  myself,  these  are 
dangerous  robbers,  intent  on  obtaining  the  con- 
tents of  my  luggage.  What  I  have  to  do  is,  be- 
fore they  come  to  any  actual  deed  of  violence, 
to  let  them  understand  that  the  contents  of  my 
bags  consist  of  nothing  but  works  of  reference 
— every  kind  of  work  of  reference,  but  nothing 
else." 

"Now  that's  extraordinarily  interesting,"  the 
major  said.  "I  suppose  you  toughen  your  brain 
on  works  of  reference,  just  as  I  do  mine  on  the 
works  of  the  author  to  whom  I  can  never  be 
sufficiently  grateful.  Now  I  wonder,"  he  con- 
tinued, "if  your  sort  of  literature  has  the  same 
effect  on  your  mind  as  mine  has  on  mine?  I 
mean  that  I  can't  possibly  read  any  book  in 
which  the  characters  aren't  always  saying  *so 
there,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  we  are.'  It's 
like  a  craze — a  sort  of  infection.  Nothing  else 
seems  really  to  amuse  me.  And  I  dare  say  it's 
the   same  with  you.     I   mean,   I   suppose  you 


RING  FOR  NANCY  31 

can*t  read  anything  that  doesn't  look  like,  *Den- 
mark,  pop.  8,000,742.  King  constitutional.  Cap. 
Cit.  Copenhagen.  .  .  .'  That's  the  sort  of 
thing  that  you  get  in  works  of  reference." 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  Sir  Arthur  said 
haughtily;  "but  I  certainly  can  not  read  the 
cryptic,  morbid  and  unpleasant  stuff  that  in  the 
present  day  passes  for  literature." 

".Well,  of  course,"  the  major  said,  "here,  in  a 
manner  of  speaking — I  mean,  that  accounts  for 
it  all.  It's  been  an  extraordinary  privilege  and 
pleasure,  getting  to  know  you.  The  moment  I 
saw  you,  I  knew^  you  to  be  some  one  command- 
ing. There  couldn't  be  the  least  mistake  about 
that.  I  thought  you  were  Vice-admiral  Sir 
Arthur  Bowles.  .  .  ." 

"You  said  Rear-admiral  just  now,"  Sir  Ar- 
thur said. 

"Rear-admiral  Sir  Arthur  Bowles,"  the  major 
continued,  undisturbed,  "because,  of  course,  an 
admiral  in  his  own  fleet  is  a  sort  of  pope.  And 
the  moment  I  saw  your,  if  you  will  pardon  my 
saying  so,  noble  head,  I  knew  you  were  a  sort 
of  pope.  And  you  are.  You  are  the  head  of  a 
church.  I  was  perfectly  right  in  wanting  your 
company.  It  will,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  pur- 
ify the  whole  day,  and  be  a  memory  to  retain 
till  the  end  of  one's  life." 


32  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Sir  Arthur  Johnson  appeared  visibly  flattered. 
He  stroked  his  white  beard,  touched  with  his 
gloved  hands  his  blue-black  mustache,  and  his 
blue-black  and  formidable  eyebrows  assumed  a 
mollified  turn. 

"Then  let  that  be  the  end  of  it,"  he  said.  "I 
was  about  to  address  some  further  remarks  to 
you.  But  they  would  probably  strike  you  un- 
pleasantly. Of  course  I  have  not  the  least  ob- 
jection to  being  unpleasant  if  it  would  be  for 
your  good,  but  at  the  end  of  this  journey  we 
shall  part,  and  you  are  probably  hardened  in 
what  I  am  bound  to  call  your  evil  courses." 

"Well,  you  speak  straight,  and  no  mistake," 
the  major  said. 

"I  do,"  Sir  Arthur  answered,  "and  if  you 
would  kindly  remove  yourself  to  the  other  end 
of  the  carriage,  opposite  your  companion,  I  may 
be  able  to  resume  the  studies  that  you  have  in- 
terrupted." 

The  major  humbly  got  up  and  humbly  sat 
down  opposite  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  The  train  con- 
tinued on  its  way;  the  old  gentleman  arose  and, 
a  fierce  and  martial  figure  in  his  fur  cloak,  he 
began  to  take  a  great  quantity  of  red  and  blue 
and  green  books  out  of  a  large  leather  kit-bag. 
These  he  laid  upon  the  seat  in  front  of  him, 
where  the  major  had  vacated  it. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  33 

^'Extraordinary  sort  of  clay  this,"  the  major 
remarked  to  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe. 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said  nothing,  and  for  a  mo- 
ment there  was  a  tranquillity  that  even  Major 
Brent  Foster — though  he  loved  a  scrap — consid- 
ered blessed.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  looking  out 
of  the  window,  and  he  considered  her  carefully. 
If  he  was  going  to  spend  at  his  uncle's  several 
days,  weeks,  or  months  in  the  society  of  Mrs. 
Howe,  of  Flossie  Delamare  and  of  his  fiancee, 
Miss  Peabody,  who  was  not  in  her  first  youth — 
being  six  years  older  than  the  major — and  in 
consequence  was  not  too  certain  of  her  charms, 
w^ell,  he  would  certainly  need  to  know  how  the 
land  lay. 

It  was  an  extraordinary  muddle.  There  was 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe;  there  could  not  be  the  least 
doubt  about  her  charms.  Olympia  certainly 
would  not  doubt  them — ^and  the  major  sighed, 
because,  of  course,  from  duty  and  inclination,  he 
had  to  consider  Olympia  first. 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  little  and  dimpled  to  a 
degree  that  the  major  hardly  believed  credible. 
It  struck  him  as  a  sort  of  false  pretenses.  She 
ought  to  be  fluffy-minded,  clinging  and  affection- 
ate; so  at  least  he  had  imagined  her  to  be  in 
the  first  days  at  Simla,  where  she  had  come  in 
the  train — as  a  sort  of  guest — of  the  viceroy's 


34  RING  FOR  NANCY 

wife.  In  those  days  he  had  been  lonely,  rottenly 
poor,  four  years  younger,  and  twenty-four  years 
gayer  and  more  irresponsible  that  he  was  even 
then.  And  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  had  trotted  about 
with  him,  little  and  dimples  and  all.  She  had 
even  read  her  novels  to  him — sloppy  novels  that 
she  turned  out  at  the  rate  of  one  a  fortnight, 
each  one  containing  a  lady  like  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
— a  sentimental  lady  who  went  extraordinarily 
"wrong".  At  that  date  she  had  not  been  able 
to  find  a  publisher  for  any  one  of  them,  though 
she  had  paid  to  publish  two. 

And  little  by  little  he  had  discovered,  even  at 
Simla,  that  in  that  little  dimpled  body  there 
dwelt  the  spirit  of  a  six-foot  grenadier.  She 
knew  what  she  wanted,  and  she  was  extraordi- 
narily set  on  getting  it.  And  one  of  the  things 
that  she  wanted,  it  had  appeared,  was  Captain 
Edward  Brent.  There  was  not  a  doubt  about 
that. 

He  really  had  not  done  much.  He  might 
have  taken  her  for  a  drive  half  a  dozen  times; 
he  had  listened  to  four  or  five  of  her  novels — it 
was  true  that  when  she  had  come  to  the  gurgly 
love  passages  she  had  always  gazed  into  his 
eyes,  but  that  was  not  his  fault.  He  had  taken 
her  to  the  Swanston  pony  races,  and  almost 
beggared  himself  over  it,  since  he  hadn^t  a  pice 


RING  FOR  NANCY  35 

but  his  captain's  pay.  He  had  certainly  com- 
miserated with  her  over  the  singularly  brutal 
letters  that  her  husband  had  written  her.  Her 
husband  had  been  a  disagreeable  invalid,  and 
she  had  come  to  India  strongly  against  his  will 
while  he  remained  at  home.  He  had  sat  with 
her  half  a  dozen  times  looking  at  the  sunset 
from  Dawson's  Tea  Gardens  through  the  deo- 
dars— a  remote  spot  that  was  pretty  solitary, 
because  few  of  the  Simla  people  knew  of  its  ex- 
istence. But  up  to  the  quite  fatal  day,  he  could 
not  recall  a  single  thing  that  he  had  "done" — 
not  so  much  as  squeezing  her  hand.  And  then, 
suddenly — it  had  happened  to  be  at  that  damned 
Dawson's  and  a  sunset  under  the  deodars — she 
had  said: 

"When  we  are  married,  we  shall  always  live 
in  a  sunset  land."  And  immediately  afterward 
she  had  looked  steadily  at  him  and  remarked, 
"My  husband  can  not  live  more  than  three 
years." 

He  could  not  even  accuse  himself  of  having 
been  weak.  He  was  Irish,  and  polite  enough  to 
be  perfectly  frank.  He  had  said  that  he  simply 
was  not  taking  any,  and  that  he  wanted  to 
marry  some  one  else;  that  he  did  not  intend  to' 
marry  any  one  unless  he  could  mairy  some  one 
else. 


36  RING  FOR  NANCY 

And  she  had  answered:  "Oh,  I  know.  A 
girl  called  Mary  Savylle.  That  was  a  silly  boy 
and  girl  affair!  Why,  you  probably  would  not 
recognize  her  if  you  saw  her  again." 

He  had  sworn  under  his  breath  at  that — ^be- 
cause it  just  showed  him  that  in  the  damned 
gossiping  nest  that  Simla  was,  there  was  not  a 
single  blessed  thing  they  did  not  find  out 
sooner  or  later — though  possibly  the  only  per- 
son that  would  be  found  to  tell  it  to  a  man's 
face  was  a  brazen  woman  like  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe. 
Simla  itself  was  damned  gossiping,  but  damned 
discreet  all  the  same.  That  was  what  made  the 
place  so  confoundedly  snaky  and  dangerous. 
Indeed,  the  very  next  thing  that  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  had  said  on  that  occasion  had  been: 

"You  know,  everybody  will  expect  you  to 
marry  me  as  soon  as  my  husband  dies.  And 
why  shouldn't  you?  You  can't  go  on  starving 
as  a  lower  grade  officer  in  India  all  your  life." 

He  had  been  perfectly  good-humored;  he  had 
said  simply  that  he  did  not  deserve  the  honor. 
But  she  had  stuck  to  it;  she  was  particularly 
earnest  on  the  point  that  he  would  never  marry 
Mary  Savylle,  whom  he  would  not  know  if  he 
met  her  again. 

It  had  given  him  what  would  have  been  the 
lesson  of  his  life  if  he  had  been  able  to  learn  any 


RING  FOR  NANCY  37 

lessons.  He  had  gone  a  thousand  miles  up 
country,  but  Mrs.  Kerr's  letters  pursued  him: 
sometimes  they  spoke  about  her  blasted  reputa- 
tion; sometimes  she  spoke  about  her  broken 
heart;  sometimes  she  wrote  about  the  good  time 
she  was  having  in  Ceylon,  in  Rangoon,  in  Cali- 
fornia, in  the  Sierra  Nevadas.  She  took  a  year 
to  get  home,  and  he  supposed  that  she  was  try- 
ing to  make  him  jealous.  Sometimes  he  an- 
swered her;  sometimes  he  did  not.  He  had  a 
lonely  life  in  a  hill  station;  and  sometimes  he 
wrote  her  chaffy  pages  for  the  sheer  want  of 
something  to  do,  or  the  sheer  want  of  keeping 
in  contact  with  some  one  who  was  not  buried  a 
thousand  miles  deep. 

Then,  next  season,  he  had  come  across  Flossie 
Delamare,  who  had  been,  as  he  had  said,  a  half- 
starved  sort  of  little  rat  at  the  time — she  had 
been  playing  French  maids  in  a  rotten  company 
that  was  going  round  the  eastern  world,  in 
places  like  Hongkong  and  Tokyo — in  a  rotten 
company  in  which  every  one  had  seemed  to  be  a 
hundred  and  two  except  Flossie.  He  had  found 
Flossie  receiving  attentions  from  a  doubtful  sort 
of  Parsee,  and  he  had  just  sailed  in  to  yank  her 
out  of  it,  as  he  said.  He  was  not  any  great 
shakes  in  Simla;  people  could  get  on  without 
him  all  right,  and  he  was  a  detrimental  even  for 


38  iRING  FOR  NANCY 

garrison  hacks.  But  just  about  then  he  had  a 
letter  from  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  to  say,  "Your  old 
flame  is  marrying  a  fat  old  man — the  Earl  of 
Cumberland,"  so  he  just  sailed  in  to  give  Flossie 
Delamare — who  had  been  a  shop-girl  from  Ox- 
ford Street — as  decent  a  sort  of  time  as  he 
could. 

Nevertheless,  he  had  told  her  carefully  at 
the  start  that  there  was  not  to  be  the  least 
idea  of  his  marrying  her;  but  he  used  to  take 
her  to  Dawson's  to  tea,  and  when  he  felt  sick 
about  Mary  Savylle  he  used  to  kiss  her.  And 
he  took  her  to  Swanston  pony  races  and  made 
bets  for  her  that  turned  out  remarkably  well,  so 
that  she  had  a  good  time  all  the  way.  And  he 
used  to  help  her  rehearsing  her  little  parts,  and 
that  was  about  all  there  was  to  it.  Then  one 
day  in  the  theater  he  had  seen  a  fat  old  man 
with  a  fattish,  darkish,  pleasant-looking  woman 
by  his  side.  He  learned  from  an  attache — quite 
by  the  grace  of  God — that  it  was  the  Earl  of 
Cumberland  with  his  new  wife,  who  had  been 
the  Dowager  Lady  Mary  Savylle — his  own 
Mary's  aunt!  So  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  had 
been  lying  or  very  clumsily  mistaken. 

And  next  day  he  had  packed  Flossie  back  to 
London  with  every  penny  he  could  scrape  up  and 
borrow  and  a  letter  to  a  fat,  kind,  real  actress 


RING  FOR  NANCY  39 

that  he  had  known  before  his  father  broke.  She 
had  written  to  him  once  or  twice  to  say  that  she 
had  got  "goodish  shops/'  and  then  he  had  gone 
to  Somaliland  to  watch  over  a  well  that  depos- 
ited alkali  at  the  bottom  of  the  corrugated  iron 
cisterns  at  the  rate  of  three  inches  a  day.  But 
the  well  had  been  all-important  for  the  safety 
of  the  Empire  in  that  part  of  the  world,  and  his 
readiness  in  watching  over  it  had  caused  him  to 
be  favorably  regarded  by  his  immediate  superi- 
ors; and  in  the  meantime  he  had  read  the  ex- 
traordinary novels  that  had,  he  considered, 
toughened  his  brain  fiber.  But  the  alkali  and 
the  well  and  the  shadelessness  and  the  reading 
had  played  the  devil  with  his  eyesight,  so  that 
when  he  had  passed  his  really  brilliant  examina- 
tion and  was  really  the  youngest  major  in  the 
British  army,  the  army  doctors  just  said  that 
he  would  not  be  fit  for  active  service  any  more. 
That  had  been  a  confoundedly  hard  knock. 
He  had  come  home  from  the  physical  examina- 
tion blundering  into  the  calm  of  the  common 
room  of  his  Bloomsbury  boarding-house,  and 
had  just  tumbled  into  an  armchair  in  a  sort  of 
fit  or  faint  or  something.  He  considered  that  it 
was  up  to  him  to  go  on  a  spree,  paint  the 
town  red — there  was  nothing  else  left.  After  all 
those  years   and  years   there  was  nothing  else 


40  RING  FOR  NANCY 

left.  He  could  not  now  go  to  Mary  Savylle — 
even  if  she  still  existed  as  Mary  Savylle,  which 
he  did  not  know — and  ofifer  the  hand  and  heart 
of  a  damaged  major  with  crocky  eyes  and  the 
end  of  the  world  before  him. 

But  in  that  common  room  of  the  Bloomsbury 
boarding-house,  when  he  had  come  in  and  col- 
lapsed, Miss  Olympia  Peabody  had  been  sitting. 
She  had  got  up  and  approached  him  with  the 
words:     "My!     Whatever  is  the  matter?" 

And  the  major,  as  soon  as  he  could  speak, 
had  looked  up  at  her  with  the  words :  "I'm 
just  drunk.  Couldn't  toe  a  line.  Couldn't  say 
the  words  *Sixty-six  identifications.'  Couldn't 
pass  any  police  tests.  Suspected  of  seeing 
double.  See  two  of  you.  Wish  there  were 
four." 

Olympia  had  started  back  from  him,  and  then 
she  said:  "But  you  did  say  the  words  sixty- 
six,  and  so  on." 

He  had  replied  with  a  sort  of  hysterical 
laugh:  "That  was  because  I  wasn't  trying.  I 
couldn't  do  it  if  I  tried!" 

And  then  he  just  told  her  all  about  it.  It  was 
the  first  time  in  his  life  that  he  had  not  kept  up 
a  mystification  when  he  had  once  begun  it. 
And  that  first  time  did  for  him — it  engaged  him 
to  Olympia  Peabody. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  41 

And  that,  he  could  not  help  seeing,  had  been 
entirely  his  own  fault.  Because  he  really  had 
flirted  with  poor  Olympia  quite  outrageously. 
It  had  begun  by  his  simply  wishing  to  give  her 
a  good  time,  just  as  he  had  tried  to  do  for 
Flossie.  She  had  seemed  to  him  a  lonely,  poor- 
ish,  lost  sort  of  soul  in  a  Bloomsbury  boarding- 
house.  He,  on  the  other  hand,  had  appeared  to 
her  to  be  a  brilliant  lost  sheep  on  the  road  to 
perdition.  Even  on  that  day  she  had  not  been 
able  not  to  believe  that  he  was  drunk.  He  cer- 
tainly announced  that  he  was  going  to  paint  the 
town  red,  so  she  had  insisted  on  accompanying 
him  to  the  Empire  Theater  of  Varieties  to  see 
that  he  did  not  throw  four  commissionaires 
down  the  stairs.  He  was  rather  astonished  to 
find  that  they  w^ent  there  together  in  an  im- 
mense motor-car,  that  apparently  belonged  to 
Miss  Peabody  herself. 

But  it  was  he  who  took  her  to  the  Tower,  be- 
cause the  Tower  seemed  to  be  the  proper  place 
for  an  American  maiden  lady.  She,  on  the  other 
hand,  suggested  that  they  should  explore  White- 
chapel,  and  later  the  opium  dens  of  the  docks. 
He  also  accompanied  her  to  Wormwood  Scrubbs 
and  Borstal  Prisons,  to  which  apparently  the 
American  embassy  had  obtained  admission.  He 
made  a  last  attempt  to  keep  her  to  orthodox 


42  RING  FOR  NANCY 

tourist  lines,  such  as  were  fitted  for  maiden 
ladies  from  Boston,  by  taking  her  to  Hampton 
Court,  where  he  informed  her  that  Lely's  Duch- 
ess of  Portsmouth  reminded  him  of  herself.  But, 
except  for  that  remark  that  had  a  great  deal  of 
success,  the  day  was  such  a  failure  that  he  gave 
up  the  tourist  ghost.  He  could  not  escape  from 
the  conviction  that  Miss  Peabody  was  enor- 
mously earnest. 

She  was,  he  discovered,  simply  here  in  order 
that  she  might  study  social  problems,  and  more 
especially  that  of  vice.  He  discovered  also  that 
she  was  enormously  wealthy,  that  she  was  the 
founder  of  the  B.S.S.V.,  and  that  if  she  was  in 
a  Bloomsbury  boarding-house,  it  was  simply  in 
order  to  study  the  serious  problems  of  British 
vice  at  close  quarters. 

Then  he  gave  her  a  letter  of  introduction  to 
his  aunt,  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster,  his  mother^s  sis- 
ter, whom  he  had  not  seen  for  ten  years  because 
his  uncle,  Arthur  Foster,  Esquire,  a  Common 
Councilman  of  the  City  of  London,  had  abused 
his  dead  father.  The  major  was,  however,  really 
fond  of  his  aunt  and  was  glad  of  an  oppor- 
tunity to  come  into  contact  with  her  again.  It 
would  not  have  entered  his  head  if,  in  the  long 
unoccupied  hours  that  he  had  to  get  through,  he 
had  not  read  listlessly  in  a  newspaper  the  item 


RING  FOR  NANCY  43 

that  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster  of  The  Pines,  Hornsey, 
the  president  of  the  N.S.R.S.  (The  National  So- 
ciety for  the  Reform  of  Sin),  was  giving  an 
afternoon  to  the  members  of  the  N.L.S.R.T. 
(The  North  London  Society  for  the  Reform  of 
the  Theater).  He  could  not  imagine  his  pleas- 
ant, soft  old  aunt  as  being  connected  with  either 
sin  or  theaters;  but  he  had  been  ten  years  out 
of  England,  and  he  recognized  that  both  sin 
and  theaters  might  have  changed. 

So  he  sent  Miss  Peabody  up  to  his  aunt,  and 
the  result  was  that  both  ladies  had  been  hanging 
round  his  neck  ever  since.  Then  he  had  learned 
from  his  aunt  that  poor  Olympia  certainly  ex- 
pected him  to  marry  her,  because  she  had  saved 
him  from  hell,  and  he  had  said  she  was  like  the 
Duchess  of  Portsmouth.  The  idea  had  seemed 
to  him  to  be  ridiculous  until  he  had  read  in  the 
paper  that  the  heiress  and  successor  to  Lord 
Savylle,  of  Higham,  was  Mary  Savylle — that 
very  Mary  Savylle  of  whom  Mrs.  Howe  had 
said  that  he  probably  would  not  recognize  her 
if  he  saw  her  again.  It  had  appeared  from  the 
newspaper  report  of  the  decease  of  the  late  peer 
that  three  of  her  cousins  having  died  in  the  ten 
years,  the  title,  as  well  as  the  estate,  going  in 
tail  female,  had  fallen  to  her. 

That  really  knocked  the  bottom  out  of  him 


44  RING  FOR  NANCY 

and  he  had,  as  he  considered,  just  let  himself  go 
to  what  was  practically  the  devil.  He  had  con- 
sented to  change  his  name  to  Brent  Foster  on 
the  definite  condition  that  he  became  his  uncle's 
heir,  married  Miss  Peabody,  who  enjoyed  an 
income  of  ninety  thousand  dollars  (eighteen 
thousand  pounds)  a  year,  and  settled  down  as 
a  country  gentleman.  But  he  did  not  care 
to  consider  these  details  of  his  fall.  He  was 
out  of  conceit  with  himself  and  life,  and  he 
was  going  down  to  remake  the  acquaintance 
of  Arthur  Foster,  Esquire,  Common  Councilman 
of  the  City  of  London,  at  the  country  house  that 
he  had  hired.  His  aunt  had  never  let  him  come 
up  to  The  Pines,  Hornsey,  because  she  had  the 
idea  that  her  nephew  had  led  a  worldly  and  glit- 
tering life.  She  thought  it  would  be  less  of  a 
shock  to  him  to  meet  his  uncle  in  one  of  the 
really  stately  homes  of  England.  It  was  called 
The  Manor,  Basildon,  in  Hampshire,  and  Olym- 
pia,  who  had  been  down  with  Mrs.  Foster  to 
inspect  it,  reported  that  it  was  chock-full  of  old 
armor,  old  contraptions,  and  secret  rooms  and 
Vandyke  paintings.  But  Major  Edward  Brent 
Foster  did  not  care  a  damn. 

He  sat  opposite  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  and  just 
wondered  gloomily  what  was  going  to  happen. 
There  he  was  going  down  to  a  house  with  that 


RING  FOR  NANCY  45 

woman  and  Flossie.  And  poor  dear  Olympia 
was  as  jealous  as  they  make  them,  and  heaven 
knew  what  racket  there  would  not  be.  He  al- 
most wished  that  he  had  not  dragged  the  old 
gentleman  into  the  carriage.  Then  he  would 
have  been  able  to  have  it  out  with  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe,  and  to  get  to  know  just  what  she  did 
intend  to  do  about  it.  The  old  gentleman  was 
deep  in  one  of  seven  books,  and  he  was  just 
going  to  risk  things  and  ask  her,  when  she 
looked  round  from  the  window,  and  with  every 
sign  of  exasperation,  asked — her  foot  tapping 
ominously  on  the  floor  of  the  carriage: 

"How  in  the  world  could  you  be  such  an  idiot 
as  not  to  let  Miss  Delamare  get  into  this  car- 
riage?'* 

The  major  started  back  and  said:  "Well,  I 
thought  she'd  be  in  the  way — considering  how 
things  are  between  us,  I  thought  she  would  be 
in  the  way." 

"How  things  are  between  us?"  she  asked 
carelessly.  "How  are  they,  I  should  like  to 
know?" 

"Well,  I  certainly  thought,"  the  major  said, 
"that  you  intended  to  marry  me  whether  I 
wanted  it  or  no." 

"That's  all  very  well,"  she  said,  "that  cock 
isn't  going  to  fight.    You  aren't  going  to  get  out 


46  RING  FOR  NANCY 

of  it  in  that  way.  I  want  to  talk  to  Miss  Dela- 
mare  before  she  can  get  to  your  uncle's.  I  can 
settle  you   afterward." 

"Oh,  no,  you  don't,"  the  major  said  with 
some  heat.  "I'm  not  going  to  have  poor  Olym- 
pia  upset.  When  we  meet  at  my  uncle's,  we 
meet  as  strangers." 

"Oh,  no,  we  don't,"  she  mocked  him.  "As  if 
I   care   whether  poor   Olympia   is   upset!" 

"Well,  she  isn't  going  to  be,"  the  major  said 
with  his  most  businesslike  air. 

"Well,  we  can't  meet  as  strangers,"  she  still 
mocked  him.  "Your  aunt  thinks  I  am  your 
oldest '  friend.  That's  why  she  has  asked  me 
down  to  meet  you." 

The  major  exclaimed:  "My  aunt!  .  .  ." 
with  an  accent  of  horror. 

"Yes,  Teddy,"  Mrs.  Howe  continued,  "your 
dear  good  aunt.  She  wants  everybody  to  be 
nice  and  homelike  for  you.  Everybody  and 
everything!  That  is  why  she  has  taken  Basildon 
Manor.  She  took  no  end  of  trouble  to  get  it 
to  welcome  you  in." 

The  major  said  blankly:  "Basildon  Manor? 
I    don't    understand  .  .  ." 

"Well,  it's  not  my  business  to  give  you  under- 
standing," the  lady  said.  "There  it  is.  Your 
aunt  wanted  you  to  be  nice  and  comfy  and  in 


RING  FOR  NANCY  47 

the  society  that  you  are  accustomed  to.  So 
she  asked  me  because  I  told  her  that  I  was 
your  oldest  friend.  And  she's  told  me  that 
she  asked  Miss  Delamare  because  Miss  Dela- 
mare  said  she  was  your  oldest  friend,  too." 

The  major  said  Hmply:  "But  what  an  ex- 
traordinary idea!" 

"It's  a  surprise  party,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said. 

"It  certainly  is,"  the  major  said. 

"And  what  I  want  to  know  is,"  the  lady  con- 
tinued, "how  you  could  be  such  an  utter  oaf 
as  to  head  Miss  Delamare  off  from  me.  She. 
is  going  to  sign  her  contract  with  your  uncle 
for  the  New  Theater  the  moment  she  gets 
down.  And  it's  the  most  important  thing  in 
the  world  for  me  to  get  her  to  promise  to  put 
on  my  play  before  she  signs.  Your  uncle  is 
opposed  to  my  ideas,  and  he  won't  let  her  do 
it  afterward.  .  .  .  The  whole  of  my  future — 
the  whole  of  our  future  may  depend  on  it.  I 
suppose  you  don't  want  to  be  a  beggar,  and  I 
lose  my  husband's  fortune  on  remarrying." 

"Oh,  I  shan't  be  a  beggar,"  the  major  said; 
"Olympia's  got  eighteen  thousand  a  year." 

"Oh,  you're  not  going  to  marry  Olympia," 
the  lady  said;  "that's  a  silly  affair.  She's  not 
in  the  least  suited  to  you.  .  .  ." 

The    major    was    just    saying:      "Look    here. 


48  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Juliana,  this  thing  has  got  to  be  settled  here 
and  now/'  when  a  roar  that  positively  re- 
minded him  of  his  first  tiger  came  from  the 
other  end  of  the  carriage.  Sir  Arthur  Johnson 
had  sprung  to  his  feet  and  had  flung  a  blue 
volume  on  to  the  floor.  The  major  saw  vaguely 
that  it  was  the  Navy  List. 

*'The  only  thing  that  I  can  think  is  that  youVe 
drunk,  sir.  Outrageously  drunk!"  Sir  Arthur 
shouted.  His  whole  face  was  purple  and  his 
whitish  blue  beard  was  quivering.  He  began 
furiously  throwing  books  into  his  open  kit-bag 
and  missing  the  opening  each  time.  He  gave 
an  idea  of  violent  and  stormy  motion,  for  as 
each  book  fell  on  the  floor  he  threw  it  at  the 
kit-bag  again,  and  the  breath  came  from  his 
nostrils  like  a  tempest. 

The  major  said:  "Well,  I'll  admit  we  were 
talking  of  rather  intimate  matters.  Perhaps 
we  ought  not  to  have  been.  But,  you  see,  I'm 
engaged  to  this  very  charming  lady.  It's  a 
painful  circumstance,  and  there's  ever  so  much 
to  talk  about." 

The  old  gentleman  became  dangerously  calm 
and  his  eyes  glittered. 

"Do  you  mean  to  say,  sir,"  he  said,  "that  you 
accuse  me  of  listening  to  your  filthy  and  degen- 
erate conversation?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  49 

"Well,  I  don't  know  what  else  it  could  have 
been,"  the  major  said,  and  he  bent  humbly  to 
pick  up  the  blue  book.  But  the  old  man 
stamped  his  foot  hard  upon  it  and  stood  like 
an  old  sea-lion  at  bay. 

"No,  you  don't,  sir,"  he  hissed.  "You  shall 
not  destroy  the  evidence  of  your  guilt.  That, 
sir,   is  a  Navy  List. 

The  major  brought  out:  "A  Na  .  .  ."  And 
then  he  said,  "Oh!" 

»"Yes,  sir,  *oh !'  "  the  old  man  said  violently. 
"A  Navy  List.     In  that  book  there  is  no  such 
name    as    that    of    Sir    Arthur    Bowles,    Rear- 
admiral." 

"Well,    of    course,    he    has    been    dead    two 

..    years,"  the  major  said  mildly. 

P      "That    book,    sir,"    the    old    gentleman    said 

coldly,  "is  three  years  old.     Your  friend  would 

have  been  in  it  if  he  only  died  two  years  ago!" 

"Well,    but    he    was    in    the    United    States 

navy!"  the  major  said.     "He  was  a  baronet  in 

his   own  right,   and  he   deserted  to  the  United 

States  in  1863.  He  wanted  to  see  service  against 

the  South.     There  wasn't  anything  discreditable 

in  his  desertion." 

"Sir,  I  have  written  a  history  of  the  war  in 
the  United  States.  I  am  intimately  acquainted 
with    all    the    circumstances.      There    was    no 


50  RING  FOR  NANCY 

English  baronet  of  the  name  of  Bowles  m  the 
Federal  naval  service." 

"Well,  of  course,  he  changed  his  name,  too," 
the  major  said,  "like  me.  He  did  not  naturally 
want  it  known.    Now,  would  he?" 

"This  is  a  pack  of  lies,"  Sir  Arthur  said.  I 

"Why,  so  it  is,"  the  major  said  brightly.  "But 
even  you  will  admit  that  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  tact." 

"No,  there  is  no  such  thing,"  the  president  of   | 
the  Quietist  Church  exclaimed.     "There  is  the 
truth.    And  there  are  lies.     You  had  better  tell   j 
the  truth  or  I  shall  take  the  proper  steps."  I 

"Well,  I've  done  my  best  to  shield  all  par-  | 
ties,"  the  major  sighed  resignedly.     "I  was  only 
doing  my  best  for  poor  Olympia.     Because   I 
don't  want  her  to  think  I  am  not  a  reformed 
character.     I  really  am." 

The  old  gentleman  continued  standing  at  one 
end  of  the  carriage. 

"Come,  sir.  The  truth!"  he  exclaimed,  and 
his  eyes  wandered  up  to  the  alarm  signal. 

"Well,  then,  this  is  the  exact  truth,"  the 
major  said.  "I  am  engaged  to  Miss  Peabody, 
of  Boston,  Massachusetts." 

"A  minute  ago  you  said  you  were  engaged  ., 
to  this  lady,"  Sir  Arthur  convicted  him  trium-  | 
phantly. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  51 

"Why,  so  I  did,"  the  major  said  pleasantly. 
"But  then  I  was  lying.  Now  I  am  telling  the 
truth." 

The  old  gentleman  turned  upon  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe.  "This  appears  to  be  a  sordid  story,  mad- 
am," he  said.  "But  if  the  matter  should  come 
to  a  breach  of  promise  trial  I  am  at  your  dis- 
posal as  a  witness  that  this  person  said  that 
he  was  engaged  to  you." 

The  major  said:  "That's  very  amiable  of 
you.  But  you  admitted  yourself  that  every- 
thing I  was  saying  then  was  a  pack  of  lies. 
Those  were  your  exact  words.  You  can't  have 
it  both  ways." 

And  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  exclaimed:  "I  beg 
you  not  to  associate  me  with  anything  so  vul- 
gar as  a  breach  of  promise  case.  I  have  other 
ways  of  enforcing  my  rights.  I  am  not  the 
president  of  the  Society  for  the  Reform  of 
Conventional  Marriage  for  nothing.  Let  me 
introduce  myself.  I  am  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  the 
famous  authoress." 
|t   The  old  gentleman  shivered  and  exclaimed: 

"Infamous!" 

The  real  truth  is,"  the  major  continued,  "that 
I  am  engaged  to  Olympia  I  did  not  wish  to 
travel  down  alone  in  a  carriage  with  a  much  too 
attractive  lady.    So  I  used  what  was  a  little  sub- 


52  RING  FOR  NANCY 

terfuge,  I  admit,  to  provide  myself  with  a  chap- 
eron. So  that's  the  real  truth,  and  I  hope  you 
will  admit  that  it  was  harmless  enough." 

"I  don't  believe  a  word  of  it,"  Sir  Arthur 
said. 

"I'm  not  accustomed  to  being  called  a  liar," 
the  major  said  angrily.  "Damn  it,  I  won't  stand 
that." 

Sir  Arthur  stretched  out  his  hand  to  the  alarm 
signal  and  continued,  holding  the  knob  in  his 
hand : 

"Don't  you  try  to  threaten  me,  sir.  I  recog- 
nized you  from  the  first  for  the  coward  and 
hired  bully  that  you  are.  I  dare  say  that  my  life 
is  in  danger,  but  I  am  not  to  be  intimidated.  I 
shall  say  my  say  come  what  will.  No  one  ever 
said  that  I  was  wanting  in  courage.  Let  me 
tell  you  that  I  recognized  your  type  from  the 
first." 

He  paused  and  pointed  an  accusing  finger  at 
the  major. 

"You,  sir,"  he  hissed,  "are  a  military  charac- 
ter. You,  madam,  are  an  immoral  authoress 
pandering  to  the  cryptic  and  morbid  tastes  of 
the  day.  I  quite  understand  that  you  have 
joined  causes  in  this  monstrous  outrage  on  my- 
self." He  breathed  deeply  and  continued: 
"You  entice  me  into  this  carriage.     I  am  will- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  -    53 

ing  to  give  you  the  excuse  that  you  are  both 
drunk.  I  am  willing  even  to  admit  that  you 
do  not  mean  to  rob  me  or  even  to  assault  me. 
You  may  want  no  more  than  to  gloat  in  some 
low  pot-house  with  your  boon  companions  over 
the  low  trick  that  you  have  played  on  me.  I 
can  quite  see  that  your  infamous  causes  of 
prize-fighter  and  panderer  to  the  filthy  tastes 
of  the  day  would  not  be  advanced  by  the  re- 
port   that    you    had    assaulted    an    old    man — a 

feeble  nonagenarian  like  myself " 

"You're  quite  sure  that  you  are  talking  about 
us?"  the  major  asked.  "It's  certainly  more 
confusing  than  reading  Henry  James.     It  really 


» 


The  old  gentleman  really  screamed: 
"Stop,  sir!"  he  shouted.     "If  you  think  that 
it  is  humorous  to  force  upon  my  attention  the 
name  of  another  of  your  filthy  young  writers 


"Young!"  the  major  exclaimed  in  a  puzzled 
manner.  "I  thought  he  was  quite  old.  A  clas- 
sic!" 

"Sacred  shade  of  Byron!"  Sir  Arthur  ex- 
claimed. "And  you,  too,  sacred  name  oi  Walter 
Scott,  that  I  knew  in  my  childhood!  Where 
are  Thackeray  and  Tennyson,  and  my  good  old 
friend  Lewis  Morris!    That  I  should  have  lived 


54  RING  FOR  NANCY 

ninety   years   in    the   land    to   hear   these   lewd 
striplings  applauded  as  classics !" 

"But  you  can't  call  that  writer  a  stripling," 
the  major  said.  *'You  could  run  him  three 
times  round  a  mile  course  yourself,  I  would  not 
mind  betting." 

"I  do  call  that  writer  a  stripling!"  the  old 
man  said  fiercely.  "1  do.  A  purveyor  of  cryp- 
tic and  morbid  vileness!" 

"Now,  come,"  the  major  said,  "I  don't  be- 
lieve you  have  read  a  word  that  was  written 
since  Macaulay  died." 

"I  haven't,  sir,"  Sir  Arthur  exclaimed  fierce- 
ly. "Not  a  word.  All  my  efforts  since  then 
have  been  confined  to  damming  up  the  foul 
tricklings  of  that  morbid  stream.  And  let  me 
tell  you,  sir,  prize-fighter  that  you  are,  I  should 
never  have  lived  to  this  splendid  and  green  old 
age  if  I  had  so  befouled  my  mind." 

"I  don't  see  why  you  call  me  a  prize-fighter," 
the  major  said.  "Of  course  it  makes  things 
much  more   amusing.     But  it's  odd!" 

"Of  course  you  are  a  prize-fighter!"  Sir 
Arthur  exclaimed.  "What  else  should  you  be? 
Is  It  not  inevitable  and  demonstrable!  You 
are  a  military  person  and  you  outrage  me  and 
you  talk  of  meretricious  and  obscene  tales  by 
young  writers  and  you  join  in  your  insult   to 


RING  FOR  NANCY  55 

me  with  the  most  meretricious  female  writer 
that  I  have  ever  heard  of — so,  of  course,  I  join 
you  with  prize-fighters.  I  do  not  mean  that 
you  have  muscle  and  nerve  to  stand  up  against 
a  trained  man  with  your  fists.  Your  unclean 
living  has  probably  deprived  you  of  those  at- 
tributes of  a  man — physical  courage  and  nerves. 
But  you  are  one  of  those  persons  who  organize 
the  disgusting  exhibitions  in  which  the  degen- 
erate descendants  of  the  most  infamous  type  of 
gladiators  .  .  ." 

"I!  Organize  a  prize-fight!"  the  major  ex^ 
claimed.     "My  God!" 

"That  is  what  you  do!"  Sir  Arthur  said. 

And  suddenly  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  cried  out: 

"The  rude  old  man  thinks  that  you  are  one 
of  the  promoters  of  the  Military  Boxing  Dis- 
plays that  a  lot  of  silly  parsons  got  stopped!" 

"I  certainly,"  Sir  Arthur  said,  "used  all  my 
influence  as  head  of  the  Quietist  Church  to  get 
those  infamous  displays  suppressed — that  and 
my  efforts  to  drive  foul  literature  off  the  book- 
stalls. .  .  ." 

"Oh,  of  course,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said.  "You 
are  one  of  the  old  Pharisees  in  fig-leaves  who 
tried  to  get  up  the  boycott  of  my  books.  I 
thought  I  knew  your  name!" 

"Knew    my    name!"      Sir    Arthur    suddenly 


56  RING  FOR  NANCY 

foamed.  "This  to  me — the  author  of  Economic 
Ethics  and  the  Modern  State!  To  me,  whom  the 
most  eminent  statesmen  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury were  proud  to  be  privileged  to  consult. 
To  me!"  He  choked  and  once  more  began  to 
cram  his  books  into  his  kit-bag.  And  then  he 
suddenly  threw  the  bag  out  of  the  window  and 
pulled  the  alarm  cord.  "To  me !"  he  said. 
"Just  Gods!  that  my  only  title  to  fame  in  this 
degenerate  day  should  be  that  I  stopped  a 
prize-fight  and  attempted  to  cleanse  the  world 
of  filthy  books." 

His  fury  was  so  terrific  that  both  the  major 
and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  cowered  in  their  corners 
while  he  stamped  up  and  down  from  end  to 
end  of  the  carriage.  The  train  slowed,  jolted, 
ground  along  the  rails  and  then  came  to  a  stop 
just  at  a  little  roadside  station.  Sir  Arthur 
sprang  out,  and  stamping  on  the  platform,  be- 
gan to  shout  for  the  guard.  The  guard  came 
running  up. 

"I  shall  see  if  the  laws  of  my  country  will 
not  protect  me  from  such  Yahoos,"  Sir  Arthur 
hissed  back  at  the  carriage.  Then  he  called 
out:  "Guard,  arrest  these  people  for  drunk- 
enness, the  use  of  obscene  language  and  as- 
sault." 

The  guard  said:     "There,  there.  Sir  Arthur, 


RING  FOR  NANCY  57 

you  know  perfectly  well  I  haven't  got  the 
power  to  arrest  anybody.  You've  got  to  issue 
a  summons,  as  you  usually  do." 

"Find  me  an  empty  first-class  carriage,"  Sir 
Arthur  exclaimed  majestically,  and  he  began 
to  stalk  off  up  the  platform. 

The  major  came  to  the  door  of  the  carriage. 

"You'd  better,"  he  said  to  the  guard,  "smell 
my  breath  and  hear  if  I  can  say  'sixty-six  inci- 
dentals.' " 

The  guard  said:  "Oh,  that's  all  right,  sir. 
Very  fiery  old  gentleman.  Sir  Arthur.  This  is 
the  third  time  he  stopped  the  six  forty-eight 
this  year."  And  he  shut  the  door  and  went 
up  the  platform  after  Sir  Arthur. 

The  engine-driver  having  stopped  the  train 
at  a  station  instead  of  in  the  open  country, 
none  of  the  passengers  had  paid  any  particular 
attention  to  the  stoppage,  except  Miss  Flossie 
Delamare,  who  came  to  her  window,  and  lean- 
ing out,  kissed  her  hand  to  the  major.  He 
drew  his  own  head  in  precipitately.  For,  just 
as  before  he  had  been  anxious  to  be  protected 
from  a  scene  with  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  now,  upon 
reconsideration,  he  was  anxious  for  an  expla- 
nation with  her.  He  wanted  to  get  perfectly 
settled  what  she  was  going  to  be  up  to  before 
he  got  down  to  his  uncle's. 


58  RING  FOR  NANCY 

He  pulled  up  the  window  and  was  about  to 
sit  down  opposite  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe. 

^'This  appears  to  me,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said, 
''to  be  an  excellent  opportunity  for  me  to  have 
some  conversation  with  Miss  Delamare  about 
my  play,"  and  she  rose  to  her  feet. 

"Oh,  come,"  the  major  said,  ''that  can  wait. 
We've  got  to  settle  about  our  relationships." 

"They're  settled  already,"  that  lady  said. 
"But  of  course  we  must  have  a  talk  about  them 
before  the  day  is  done,"  and  vigorously  she 
pushed  past  him  toward  the  door.  He  caught 
hold  of  her  wrist. 

"Look  here,  Juliana,"  he  said,  "I  can't  go 
having  tete-a-tetes  with  you  in  my  uncle's 
house." 

"It  would  upset  Olympia.^"  she  asked  amia- 
bly. 

"It  would  upset  the  whole  blooming  lot,"  the 
major  said.  "My  uncle,  my  aunt,  Olympia,  me 
— everybody." 

She  slipped  her  hand  neatly  out  of  his  fin- 
gers. "Oh,  would  it?"  she  said.  "Well,  I'm 
afraid  they  are  going  to  be  upset,"  and  she  was 
gone  out  of  the  carriage. 

She  got  hold  of  a  sleepy  porter  who  had 
been  awakened  from  a  nap  by  the  unaccus- 
tomed stopping  of  the   mail,   and  in  a   minute 


RING  FOR  NANCY  59 

she  had  got  her  dressing-bag  and  her  jewel- 
case  out  of  the  major's  carriage  and  into  Miss 
Delamare's.  From  the  door  the  major  could 
perceive  Sir  Arthur  foaming  down  the  platform 
like  a  great  white  wave.  And  the  major  had 
to  do  a  lot  of  rapid  reflection.  In  the  first 
place,  he  knew  perfectly  well  that  it  would  not 
be  the  least  use  getting  in  with  Flossie  and 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  would  be 
talking  about  her  play  the  whole  way  down, 
and  that  would  bore  him  to  extinction.  On 
the  other  hand,  if  he  didn't  get  into  the  same 
carriage  to  check  them  they  would  almost  cer- 
tainly compare  notes  as  to  his  past  career,  and 
he  didn't  know  that  he  wanted  that.  He  had, 
of  course,  to  think  of  poor  Olympiads  feelings 
as  much  as  possible,  and  he  was  convinced  that 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  would  do  all  that  she  possibly 
could  to  give  poor  Olympia  a  lively  time.  His 
uncertainty,  however,  was  cut  short  by  the 
guard,  who  came  running  up  to  beg  him  to 
get  into  the  other  carriage  with  his  other  lady 
friends,  so  as  to  leave  Sir  Arthur  an  empty 
first.  And  the  major,  with  a  good-tempered 
"Oh,  well,"  got  himself  out  of  his  own  carriage 
and  into  the  next.  He  was  just  saying  cheer- 
fully to  Flossie  Delamare,  *'You  wicked,  aban- 
doned little  wretch,"  when  Sir  Arthur,  his  eyes 


60  RING  FOR  NANCY 

blazing,  his  beard  working  convulsively,  thrust 
his  head  in  at  the  window  and  shouted: 

*'.You  wicked  abandoned  wretch.  Don't 
think  to  escape  me  in  this  way.  You  hired 
bully,  you  atrocious  drunken  sot  with  your 
abandoned  female  companions,  the  moment  I 
get  to  my  destination  I  shall  issue  a  summons 
against  you  for  drunkenness,  assault  and  the 
use  of  obscene  language."  His  head  disap-  | 
peared  like  that  of  a  Jack-in-the-box,  leaving 
the  guard  visible  behind  him. 

"Do  you  suppose  he'll  take  out  a  summons 
against  me?"  the  major  asked. 

"He'll  certainly  issue  it  himself,"  the  guard 
said.  "He's  one  of  these  liberal  J.P.'s — pre- 
cious fond  of  issuing  summonses."  The  guard 
disappeared. 

"Drunkenness!  Assault!  The  use  of  obscene 
language!"  Miss  Flossie  Delamare  laughed. 
"That'll  make  a  pretty  lively  time  for  poor 
Olympia  when  the  summons  comes  on." 

The  major  said,  "Oh,  rot!"  and  then  he  hur- 
riedly began  to  talk  to  her  in  the  hope  of 
heading  off  Mrs.   Kerr  Howe. 

"You  wicked,  abandoned  little  wretch,"  he 
said,  "what  do  you  mean  by  not  telling  me  you 
were  going  down  to  my  aunt's?  What  do  you 
mean  by  telling  my  aunt  that  you  were  one  of 
my  best  friends?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  61 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said,  "if 
it  comes  to  good  wishes,  I  am  sure  I'm  the  best 
friend  youVe  got  in  the  world.  And  as  for 
taking  you  in  .  .  .  why,  you're  such  a  precious 
hand  at  mystification  yourself  that  it's  a  fine 
old  temptation  to  score  off  you  sometimes." 

"But  hang  it  all,"  the  major  said,  "you  did 
it  so  confoundedly  well.  When  you  talked 
about  parting  forever  there  were  tears  in  your 
eyes." 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said  with 
a  little  hurt  air,  "you  seem  to  forget  sometimes 
that  I  a7n  an  actress." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  suddenly  cut  in  with  what 
appeared  to  be  a  victorious  snicker: 

"Your  half-brother,"  she  said,  "has  been  tell- 
ing me  the  most  romantic  story  about  your  re- 
lationships." 

Miss  Delamare  exclaimed,  "My  half-brother!" 
and  then  she  looked  at  the  major  and  got  from 
his   face  one   of  her  brilliant  inspirations. 

"Oh,  Teddy  you  mean!"  she  said.  "I 
thought  you  meant  that  old  gentleman  who 
might  have  been  an  uncle  to  me.  Well,  I  hope 
Teddy  hasn't  been  saying  things  against  me 
behind   my  back." 

And  the  major  sank  down  into  his  corner 
with  a  sigh  of  deep  relief.  He  couldn't  now 
have  any  doubt  that  Flossie  Delamare  wouldn't 


h 


62  RING  FOR  NANCY 

give  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  any  kind  of  a  handle 
against  him,   and  he  just  said: 

"The   times  weVe   seen!" 

"Yes,  the  times  we've  seen,  Teddy!'*  Miss 
Delamare  said  with  a  little  regretful  sigh,  and 
then,  immediately  afterward,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
was  all  over  her  like  a  wave  with  her  projects 
for  the  New  Theater.  The  major  never  got 
another  word  in.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  explained 
the  plot  of  her  play.  She  dilated  on  the  high- 
mindedness  of  all  the  characters  except  the 
villain.  She  explained  how  the  play  would 
help  on  the  reform  of  conventional  marriage. 
The  major  never  got  a  word  in,  and  at  last  he 
took  from  the  pocket  of  his  rain-proof  coat  a 
volume  called  The  Sacred  Fount,  and  began  to 
puzzle  over  its  contents.  The  Westinghouse 
brake,  which  had  been  strained  by  the  sudden 
stopping  of  the  train,  burst  about  a  quarter 
of  an  hour  later,  and  by  the  time  the  train  had 
slowed  down  a  little,  one  of  the  carriages  about 
three  ahead  of  them  took  it  into  its  head  to  run 
off  the  line.  It  was  nothing  like  a  serious  ac- 
cident, but  it  jolted  them  a  good  deal.  But 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  talked  on  steadily  about  her 
play,  and  although  it  was  a  quarter  to  eleven 
before  they  reached  Basildon  Manor  she  was 
still  talking  about  it. 


Ill 

lyrRS.  ARTHUR  FOSTER— Major  Brent 
ITA  Foster's  annt — was  anxiously  seeing  to 
the  warmth  of  his  bedroom  in  Basildon  Manor 
at  about  half  past  ten  that  night.  It  is  true 
that  it  was  early  June,  but  she  was  con- 
vinced that,  after  many  years  in  one  tropic  and 
another,  he  would  find  it  cool  enough.  A  fire 
burned  in  the  grate;  there  was  a  hot  bottle  in 
the  immense  and  shadowy  four-post  bed.  And! 
all  the  room  wavered  between  shadowiness  and 
warmth.  The  fireplace  was  as  large  as  a  Lon- 
don pantry;  the  dogs  on  the  hearth  w^ere  as  large 
as  the  London  umbrella  stand;  the  burning  logs 
were  as  big  as  Mrs.  Foster's  husband's  portman- 
teau; the  velvet  curtained  bed  was  as  big  as  she 
imagined  desert  islands  to  be,  and  the  immense 
picture  of  Ancestors  that  faced  the  foot  of  the 
bed  was  at  least  as  large  as  the  immense  fold- 
ing-doors between  the  front  and  rear  dining- 
rooms  of  The   Pines,   Hornsey. 

And  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster  was  a  little  afraid 
of  this  picture — "the  panel,"  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  called  it.     It  represented  three  fierce  men 

63 


64  RING  FOR  NANCY 

in  broad-brimmed  and  plumed  hats;  three  ladies 
in  velvet,  pearls,  low  necks  and  fringes;  one  lit- 
tle boy  v^ith  long  curls  and  a  slouch  hat;  three 
little  girls  in  low  necks,  one  of  them  held  a  par- 
rot, another  a  monkey,  and  the  third  attended 
on  by  a  greyhound.  A  baby,  also  in  a  low- 
necked  dress,  sprawled  on  the  ground  in  the  at- 
tempt to  reach  a  parti-colored  ball.  All  these 
people  were  represented  as  standing  in  the  open 
air,  in  a  group  like  a  wall,  as  people  stand  now- 
adays to  be  photographed,  and  with  the  excep- 
tion of  the  baby,  gazed  fiercely,  mildly,  or  with 
unseeing  glances  at  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster. 

Having  done  all  she  could  for  the  major*s 
room,  she  had  to  pause  and  look  round,  and 
those  eyes  irresistibly  drew  her  glance.  She 
really  shivered,  and  then  she  said  to  her  lady- 
ship's own  maid: 

"Dear  me,  Miss  Nancy  Jenkins,  my  dear, 
wouldn't  you  say  they  were  asking  me  how  I 
dared  to  be  in  their  room?" 

"No,  I  shouldn't  ma'am,"  her  ladyship's 
own  maid  replied;  "you're  nothing  to  the  peo- 
ple they  did  see  in  their  own  rooms  when  they 
were  alive." 

"No,  poor  dears,  I  dare  say  not,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter said.  "And  I  dare  say  they'd  know  how  re- 
spectful and  how  like  an  intruder  I  feel." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  65 

"Now  you  needn't,  ma'am,"  Miss  Nancy  Jen- 
kins said  kindly.  "I'm  sure  the  last  thing  her 
ladyship  would  want  you  to  feel  is  anything 
but  entirely  at  home.  Her  ladyship  begged 
me  to  make  you  and  Major  Brent  feel  absolute- 
ly and  entirely  as  if  the  place  belonged  to  you. 
Her  ladyship  begged  me  particularly  to  ask 
you  to  remember,  if  there  isn't  any  other  way 
of  making  you  see  it,  that  if  it  wasn't  for  you 
taking  the  place  in  the  summer  she  could  not 
afford  to  live  in  it  for  the  spring  and  autumn. 
She  would  have  to  sell  it  and  all  the  dear  old 
things." 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  timidly  at  her  ladyship's 
own  maid. 

"Dear  me,  Miss  Nancy  Jenkins,"  she  said, 
"did  her  ladyship  really  ask  you  to  say  that?" 

"It's  what  her  ladyship  particularly  wishes 
you  to  understand,"  the  maid  answered.  "Par- 
ticularly. More  than  anything  else.  She  loves 
the  old  things,  and  she  wants  them  to  make 
people  happy." 

"I  feel  afraid  of  them  really,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said.  "I  would  not  like  people  to  know  it.  But 
they're  all  so  old  and  so  stern  and  so  precious 
that  sometimes  I'm  afraid  to  turn  round  for 
fear  of  breaking  them.  And  sometimes — ohl  I 
really  wish   I   was   back  in   my   own   drawing- 


66  RING  FOR  NANCY 

room  at  Hornsey,  where  there's  nothing  really 
valuable  except  the  Berlin  wool-work  screen 
that  was  worked  by  the  Princess  Alice's  own 
hands  for  the  Great  Exhibition  of  '52,"  She 
stopped  and  looked  almost  lovingly  at  her 
ladyship's  own  maid. 

Miss  Jenkins  smoothed  her  black  alpaca 
apron. 

"I'm  afraid,"  she  said,  "that  it's  her  lady- 
ship's leaving  me  that  has  given  you  that  sort 
of  idea,"  she  said.  "But,  indeed,  madam,  that 
was  not  meant  as  a  ...  as  a  precaution  against 
yourself.  The  best  of  people  have  now  and 
then  a  servant  that's  a  breaker,  and  her  lady- 
ship values  every  stick  of  her  house  as  if  it 
were  one  of  her  little  fingers."  She  stopped, 
and  then  added:  "But  rather  than  take  away 
from  your  satisfaction,  rather  than  you  should 
feel  that  you  are  being  watched  upon,  I'm 
perfectly  certain  that  her  ladyship  would  pre- 
fer me  to  go  to-night." 

"Oh,  but  my  dear,  my  dear  Miss  Nancy  Jen- 
kins," Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed  on  a  note  of  al- 
most painful  anxiety,  and  then  she  stopped  dis- 
tractedly. "You're  perfectly  certain/^  she  asked, 
"that  those  cigars  are  the  sort  of  cigars  the 
major  will  like?" 

"Well,  you  never  can  be  quite  certain  what  a 


RING  FOR  NANCY  67 

gentleman  will  like,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  an- 
swered; "but  you  can  be  perfectly  certain  that 
they're  not  the  kind  of  cigars  that  you  need 
be  ashamed  of,  and  that's  the  important  point. 
They're  the  sort  that  her  ladyship  always  has 
in  the  house  for  her  gentlemen  friends.  And 
they're  the  sort  that  Captain  Brent  used  always 
to  smoke  at  Holbury  before  he  went  away.  Of 
course,  there's  no  saying  that  his  tastes  may 
have  changed." 

*'Then  there  you  are.  Miss  Nancy,"  Mrs. 
Foster  said  triumphantly.  "How  could  I  get 
on  in  this  great  ugly  old  house  if  I  hadn't  you 
to  back  me  up?  What  do  I  know  about  gen- 
tlemen's tastes?  Of  course  there's  Mr.  Foster 
< — he's  a  true  gentleman;  but  of  course  he's  not 
a  real  gentleman.  I  mean  not  a  manly  gentle- 
man like  the  major." 

"Well,  of  course,  you  couldn't  have  every  one 
in  the  world  like  the  major,"  Miss  Jenkins  said, 
"or  there  wouldn't  be  room  to  hold  us." 

Mrs.   Foster's  eyes  wandered  to  the  panel. 

"Now,  who  did  you  say  all  those  angry-look- 
ing people  were?"  she  asked.  "You've  told 
me  once,  but  I've  forgotten.  And  it  would  be 
too  silly  not  to  be  able  to  tell  the  major  any- 
thing about  anything."  Miss  Jenkins  pointed 
to  the  tallest  of  the  three  men  in  slouch  hats. 


68  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"That  was  the  fourth  earl,"  she  said  succinct- 
ly. "Fell  at  Naseby  four  years  after  the  pic- 
ture was  painted.  The  two  elder  sons,  Lord 
Edward,  afterward  fifth  earl,  and  Lord  Charles 
fell  at  the  battle  of  the  Boyne.  The  baby  on 
the -ground.  Lord  James,  afterward  sixth  earl, 
was  attaindered  after  the  battle  in  which  he 
took  part.  The  baby's  son.  Lord  William,  was 
restored  to  the  Barony  of  Higham,  but  not  the 
earldom,  upon  his  reconciliation  with  Queen 
Anne.  He  was  known  as  'Wild  Higham,'  be- 
cause there  was  nothing  that  he  would  stick 
at.  His  portrait  is  in  the  long  dining-room: 
said  to  bear  a  strong  resemblance  to  her  lady- 
ship." 

"That's  what  I  can't  bear,"  Mrs.  Foster  said 
with  deep  feeling.  "W^herever  I  go  all  over 
the  house  they're  all,  all  of  them,  always  look- 
ing at  me,  and  they're  all  alike.  And  the  wife 
of  the  eldest  son  always  has  that  same  pearl 
necklace  on,  and  they  all,  you  feel,  all  of  them, 
stick  at  nothing." 

"That's  so,  ma'am,"  Miss  Nancy  Jenkins 
said.  "There's  not  one  of  them  that  ever 
would.  Never  stick  at  anything  once  it  came 
into  their  heads — the  Wild  Highams  wouldn't." 

"Now,  I  don't  know  how  I  feel  about  ^that, 
Miss  Nancy,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.     "Everything's 


RING  FOR  NANCY  69 

always  so  difficult  to  get  at.  In  the  first  place, 
on  principle,  I  oughtn't  to  approve  of  people 
who  don't  care  what  they  do.  But  then  I  can't 
help  saying  that  there  was  my  brother-in-law, 
Admiral  Brent,  the  major's  father — he  stuck  at 
nothing,  as  you  put  it,  and  I  always  used  to 
think  he  was  the  finest  man  I  ever  met,  though 
of  course  I  shouldn't  like  Mr.  Foster  to  hear 
me  talking  like  that.  Not  that  he's  jealous, 
but  he  strongly  disapproved  of  everything  the 
admiral  did.  But  he  was  a  fine  man,  though 
what  with  not  paying  attention  to  Mr.  Foster's 
advice  about  his  speculations,  and  what  with 
high  living  and  throwing  his  money  out  of  the 
window,  and  charities  he  couldn't  afford  and 
all  the  rest  of  it — he  took  a  race  horse  full  gal- 
lop down  some  cliffs  in  India,  where  they  say 
only  ponies  went,  for  a  bet.  And  he  won  the 
bet. 

"But  he  died  three  weeks  after  my  poor 
sister — Edward's  mother — and  he  didn't  leave 
behind  him  any  money,  but  eleven  hundred 
and  sixty-two  pounds'  worth  of  debt  which  I 
paid  out  of  my  own  jointure,  for  the  sake  of 
the  name.  Though  that  made  Mr.  Foster  furi- 
ously angry,  for  he  said,  what  was  the  name 
of  a  dissolute  scoundrel  to  him.  And  poor  dear 
Edward — the  major — paid  the  money  back  out 


70  RING  FOR  NANCY 

of  his  salary — I  mean  his  pay,  because,  of 
course,  you  ought  not  to  talk  of  what  an  offi- 
cer gets  as  a  salary.  But  he  did  his  best,  poor 
dear,  having  put  aside  fifty  pounds  a  year, 
which  was  paid  me  regularly  by  the  paymaster 
of  the  war  office  when  he  was  only  a  captain, 
and  then  advancing  it  to  seventy-five  pounds 
a  year  when  he  was  on  active  service,  when, 
of  course,  they  get  more,  as  you  doubtless 
know.  So  that  at  the  present  moment  he  only 
owes  me  four  hundred  thirty-three  pounds,  thir- 
teen shillings,  fourpence,  with  interest.  And 
that  was  what  all  the  trouble  was  about,"  Mrs. 
Foster  ended  suddenly. 

"I  don't  see  about  what,  ma'am,"  Miss  Nancy 
Jenkins  said,  "or  what  the  trouble  was." 

"The  trouble  was,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "that 
he  blacked  his  uncle's  eye.  Because,  of  course, 
Mr.  Foster,  who's  the  kindest  and  best  gentle- 
man in  the  world,  but  a  little  wanting  in  tact 
where  his  brother-in-law  the  admiral  was  con- 
cerned— Mr.  Foster  was  much  more  outrageous 
when  Captain  Edward  started  to  pay  the  money 
back  than  he  was  with  me  for  having  paid  it 
out — he  said  that  I  wasn't  to  take  money  from 
the  pauper  son  of  a  bankrupt  swindler.  But  I 
said,  no,  let  the  boy  do  his  duty  to  his  father's 
memory!      It    was    right    and    proper,    and    it 


RING  FOR  NANCY  71 

showed  a  good  spirit.  Not,  of  course,  that  I 
was  going  to  take  the  money,  for  God  knows 
there  isn't  a  thing  I  wouldn't  give  the  boy, 
even  down  to  the  gold  and  the  false  teeth  out 
of  my  head,  though,  of  course,  that's  not  a 
thing  I  ought  to  say,  but  it's  perfectly  true. 
And  then,  there  came  that  awful  trouble,  and  I 
never  saw  my  Edward  again  for  ten  years." 
Mrs.  Foster  broke  off  and  remarked  innocently, 
*'Why,  you're  crying,  Miss  Nancy!" 

"You're  crying  yourself,  ma'am,"  Miss  Nancy 
said  sharply. 

"And  well  I  may  be,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "con- 
sidering the  difference  there  is  in  the  poor  boy." 

"Oh,  don't  say  that,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said. 

"But  it's  true,"  Mrs.  Foster  maintained. 
"There  was  a  time  when  you  could  say  he 
didn't  care  what  he  did,  like  those  people 
there,"  and  she  pointed  to  the  panel.  "Now, 
you  can  say  he  doesn't  care  what  he  does — 
just  because  he  doesn't  care  what  becomes  of 
him.     There's  no  spirit  left  in  him." 

Miss  Jenkins  said,  "Oh,  dear!  Oh,  dear!"  with 
so  much  real  concern  that  Mrs.  Foster  was 
heartened  to  continue  talking  about  her  nephew; 
for,  as  a  rule,  she  was  too  much  afraid  of  bor- 
ing Miss  Jenkins  to  talk  for  long  about  any  one 


72  RING  FOR  NANCY 

subject.  And  as,  indeed,  she  was  afraid  of  bor- 
ing everybody,  her  conversation  was  usually 
extremely  disjointed. 

Mrs.  Foster  was  the  daughter  of  a  Ports- 
mouth ship-chandler  in  very  good  circum- 
stances, and  it  was  characteristic  of  Edward 
Brent's  father — the  gentleman  who  stuck  at 
nothing — that  he  should  just  have  sailed  in  and 
married  her  sister,  who  was  a  handsome  flash- 
ing woman.  He  was  at  the  time  a  penniless 
Irish  naval  lieutenant.  It  was  not  until  many 
years  later  that  Mrs.  Foster  married  Mr.  Ar- 
thur Foster,  at  that  time  a  .West  End  baker 
with  five  flourishing  businesses.  It  was  char- 
acteristic of  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  that  he  should 
have  inquired  carefully  how  much  money  the 
ship-chandler's  daughter  had  to  her  account  be- 
fore he  proposed  to  her.  And  with  her  money, 
he  had  been  able  to  turn  his  business  into  a 
limited  company,  which  had  twenty-three 
branches  in  London  and  over  a  hundred  in 
various  cities  of  the  United  Kingdom  and  the 
colonies.  So  that,  until  lately,  Mr.  Arthur  Fos- 
ter had  been  able  to  boast  himself  the  largest 
wholesale  baker  in  the  world.  Latterly,  how- 
ever, he  had  come  to  talk  less  of  being  a  baker 
and  more  of  the  fact  that  he  was  a  Common 
Councilman  of  the   City  of  London.     He  even 


RING  FOR  NANCY  73 

had  a  hope  of  an  aldermanship — nay,  in  his 
dreams  he  even  passed  the  Chair. 

The  lieutenant — later  the  admiral — quarreled 
most  ferociously  with  his  wife  whenever  he  was 
at  home.  There  never,  Mr.  Foster  was  accus- 
tomed to  say,  were  such  scenes.  Nevertheless, 
to  the  long  unmarried  sister,  Captain  Brent  had 
always  been  held  up  as  the  very  model  of 
manly  virtues — as  long  as  he  was  at  sea.  His 
rapid  promotion,  his  quite  splendid  service  in 
Western  Chinese  waters,  and  the  extraordinary 
facility  in  slinging  out  oaths,  caused  him  to  be, 
for  the  unmarried  sister,  a  sort  of  splendid  ter- 
ror. And  this  made  her  husband — the  respect- 
able and  wealthy  Baptist — detest  the  admiral 
even  more  than  he  would  otherwise  have  done. 

Thus,  when  the  admiral  died  in  debt  and 
Mrs.  Foster  had  paid  it  off,  and  Captain  Ed- 
ward announced  his  intention  of  paying  his  aunt 
back,  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  really  had  called  the 
captain  "the  pauper  son  of  a  bankrupt  swindler" 
to  the  captain's  face.  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  had 
particular  reason  to  be  cock-a-hoop  that  day, 
for  he  had  just  made  arrangements  for  the 
opening  of  the  last  fifty  of  his  bakers'  shops — 
in  Australasia.  He  had  never  been  bigger  than 
his  boots  before,  for  he  had  always  been  a 
rather   timid   person.     And   he   certainly   never 


74  RING  FOR  NANCY 

was  again,  for  when  the  captain  knocked  him 
down  he  got  such  a  shock,  that,  for  the  rest 
of  his  life,  he  was  humble  even  to  the  pay-check 
girls  in  the  glass  cases  in  his  shops.  He  was 
simply  afraid  of  getting  a  harsh  word  addressed 
to  him  by  anybody. 

But  Captain  Brent  had  simply  disappeared. 
He  had  gone  right  straight  out  to  India,  and 
they  had  never  heard  another  word  from  him. 
Not  a  single  word!  His  father,  the  admiral, 
had  really  spoiled  him  in  no  ordinary  manner 
— had  never  grudged  him  a  penny,  and  had 
never  suggested  that  he  was  not  to  live  up  to 
ten  thousand  a  year  for  the  rest  of  his  life. 
And  since  Captain  Brent  had  been  gay,  reck- 
less and  always  in  a  good  humor,  he  had  lived 
like  a  fighting-cock  in  the  best  of  society. 

It  was  characteristic  of  him,  however,  that 
he  had  not  made  a  good  match,  but  had  fallen 
head  over  heels  in  love  at  last  with  a  Miss 
Mary  Savylle,  whom  he  met  during  a  three 
weeks'  stay  at  the  Duke  of  Cumberland's  at 
Thorbury.  Miss  Savylle  had  been  a  daredevil 
young  lady,  without  a  penny  to  her  name, 
though  her  granduncle.  Lord  Savylle  of  Hig- 
ham,  allowed  her  four  hundred  pounds  a  year, 
and  she  spent  her  life  traveling  with  a  maid 
from   country-house   to   country-house. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  75 

Miss  Savylle  had  appealed  to  him,  because 
she  was  simply  the  only  girl  he  had  ever 
met  who  didn't  care  what  she  did.  She 
didn't  care  a  rap.  She  contradicted  the 
Bishop  of  Liverpool  at  table  when  he  said 
that  her  bulldog  had  not  got  a  soul,  and  she 
put  on  the  old  duke's  favorite  old  boots  over 
her  slippers  when  she  wanted  to  run  over  the 
wet  lawn  one  early  morning,  because  she  had 
thrown  her  hair-brush  out  of  the  window  at  a 
terrier  that  was  chasing  a  cat.  The  duke  had 
his  favorite  boots  for  fourteen  years — Welling- 
tons they  were^r^nd  he  put  them  on  every 
hunting  morning.  So  that  the  valet  turned 
green  when  Miss  Savylle  rushed  from  her  bed- 
room in  her  wrapper  and  slippers,  and  tearing 
the  boots  from  his  hands,  pulled  them  suddenly 
on  and  streamed  out  of  the  front  door.  The 
terrier  was  still  worrying  the  cat,  and  Miss 
Savylle  got  slightly  scratched  and  badly  bitten 
in  separating  them.  There  was  even  blood 
upon  the  sacrosanct  boots. .  But  the  duke 
hardly  even  grumbled,  which  was  a  thing  un- 
heard of  in  Thorbury. 

That  afternoon  the  captain  declared  his  love 
to  Miss  Savylle,  and  that  night  he  had  had  a 
telegram  to  say  that  his  mother  was  dead. 
Three  weeks  later  his  father  had  died  of  having 


ye  RING  FOR  NANCY 

nobody  to  quarrel  with.  Captain  Edward  had 
found  himself  worse  than  penniless,  and  they 
had  just  had  to  part.  For  Lord  Savylle  of 
Higham  threatened  to  cut  off  his  great-niece's 
allowance  of  four  hundred  a  year  if  she  thought 
of  marrying  a  man  who  hadn't  at  least  that 
much  above  his  captain's  pay.  Captain  Edward 
had  indeed  gone  up  to  The  Pines,  Hornsey, 
definitely  intending  to  ask  his  aunt  to  settle 
four  hundred  pounds  a  year  on  Mary  Savylle. 
His  aunt  had  neither  chick  nor  child;  she  had 
always  told  him  to  regard  himself  as  her  heir, 
and  he  would  not  have  had  any  compunction 
in  asking  her.  Unfortunately,  his  aunt  had 
been  out,  and  he  had  come  upon  his  uncle  in 
a  cock-a-hoop  mood,  and  angry  because  Mrs. 
Foster  had  paid  the  father's  debts.  Thus,  the 
frightful  row  had  arisen;  the  captain  had  felt 
forced  to  pay  his  aunt  back;  the  Common 
Councilman  had  a  very  black  eye,  which  kept 
him  away  from  business  for  the  best  part  of  a 
fortnight,  and  Captain  Edward  found  himself, 
not  four  hundred  pounds  a  year  richer,  but  fifty 
pounds  a  year  poorer. 

"Oh,  Miss  Jenkins,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "he 
went  away  without  a  word  from  me,  and  al- 
though I  made  Mr.  Foster  write  letter  after  let- 
ter of  apology — which  does  not   say  that   Mr. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  77 

Foster  had  much  spirit,  though  it  shows  he 
had  a  kind  heart  and  a  conscience — Captain 
Edward  always  sent  the  letters  back  unopened. 
And  I've  heard  that  he  has  had  a  very  bad 
time,  working  terribly  hard.  And  now  he's 
come  back,  and  his  eyes  have  failed,  and  he 
can't  go  on  active  service  any  more.  And  he 
had  to  change  his  name — which  was  a  good 
honorable  name,  and  it  seems  a  shame.  But  I 
was  quite  firm  about  it,  for  I  said — though  Mr. 
Foster  wasn't  himself  so  set  upon  it — but  I 
said,  'justice  is  justice,'  and  if  the  boy  is  to 
inherit  his  uncle's  money,  it  is  only  just  that 
he  should  spend  it  in  the  name  of  the  man 
that  made  it,  and  he's  going  to  marry  a  ter- 
rible woman." 

Miss  Jenkins  asked:  *'Don't  you  like  Miss 
Peabody,   ma'am?" 

"No,  I  don't,"  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed,  with 
a  sudden  vehemence.  "I  don't  believe  I  ever 
disliked  anybody  else  in  my  life  except  a  man 
cook  we  once  had." 

**I  don't  believe  you  ever  did  dislike  anybody, 
ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  said. 

"But  I  disHke  Miss  Peabody,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said.  "Before  she  got  the  major  she  was  quite 
different,  you  would  have  said  that  butter 
wouldn't   melt   in   her  mouth.     And   I   did   my 


78  RING  FOR  NANCY 

very  best  to  bring  the  match  off,  because  I 
thought  she  would  save  the  major  from  the 
road  to  ruin.  But  now  she's  got  him  she's  per- 
fectly different.  Why,  she  might  be  that  odious 
man  cook,  with  her  impertinence  and  her  offish 
ways.  I  know  I'm  a  stupid  woman,  but  it's 
no  one's  business  to  tell  me  so  all  day  long. 
And  the  eyes  she  makes  at  Mr.  Foster,  and  the 
compliments  he  pays  her  on  her  ability.  And 
to  tell  the  truth,  she's  a  great  deal  more  fitted 
for  Mr.  Foster  than  the  major — they're  more 
of  an  age,  anyhow.  I  tell  you  what  it  is.  Miss 
Nancy" — and  Mrs.  Foster's  eyes  became  almost 
shining  with  rage — "I'd  give  almost  any  woman 
four  hundred  a  year — I'd  give  it  to  Miss  Dela- 
mare  or  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  or  I'd  give  it  to  you 
for  the  matter  of  that — if  you  would  get  the 
major  away  from  that  woman.  You  couldn't 
do  it,  of  course,  because  the  major  is  so  set  on 
his  duty.  And  he  considers  it  is  his  duty  to 
marry  that  odious  old  maid.  Why,  her  teeth 
aren't  even  her  own.  But  you  couldn't  get  him 
away." 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  said  Miss  Jenkins, 
and  she  smoothed  down  her  apron.  "But  upon 
my  word,  ma'am,  it's  rather  a  wicked  sug- 
gestion." 

"I  don't  see  it's  a  wicked  suggestion,"  Mrs. 


I 


RING  FOR  NANCY  79 


Foster  said.  "I've  got  to  think  of  my  poor 
nephew's  happiness.  Now,  Miss  Delamare  is  a 
dear  Httle  thing,  and  I've  often  felt  I  should 
like  to  adopt  her  as  a  daughter.  And  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  isn't  so  nice,  but  she'd  make  the  major 
an  intellectual  companion.  And  as  for  you. 
Miss  Nancy,  I  like  you  the  best  of  them  all,  for, 
though  I've  only  known  you  for  the  three  days 
we've  been  down  here  getting  ready,  I  feel 
that  you  are  quite  one  of  the  family — though 
of  course  your  family  is  not  so  good  as  his. 
But  his  father  married  below  him,  marrying 
my  sister;  and  though  they  did  quarrel  like  cat 
and  dog,  it  was  one  of  the  happiest  marriages 
I  have  ever  known,  and  they  died  within  three 
weeks  of  each  other." 

Miss  Jenkins  pushed  her  hands  into  the  pock- 
ets of  her  alpaca  apron. 

"You  can't  be  quite  in  earnest,  ma'am." 
Mrs.  Foster  answered  quaintly:  "I  don't 
know  that  I  should  be  so  in  earnest  if  it  was 
possible  to  happen,  but  as  it  is,  I'm  in  deadly 
earnest.  I'd  rather  see  the  major  married  to 
you  than  to  that  odious  woman,  with  her  odious 
lap-dog.  Even  the  lap-dog  himself  hates  her. 
But  you  couldn't  get  him  away  from  her.  No- 
body could.  He's  a  gentleman,  and  he's  passed 
his  word  to  marry  the  lady." 


80  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"But  don't  you  think,"  Miss  Jenkins  said, 
"that  the  lady  might  be  got  to  throw  the  gentle- 
man over?'* 

"Never!"  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed,  "never, 
while  there  is  a  sun  in  the  sky,  or  a  railway 
from  Hornsey  to  the  city,  which  is  almost  the 
same  thing." 

And  then  she  added  with  singular  vivacity: 
"Do  you  say  that's  wicked.  Miss  Nancy?  Well, 
then  it's  just  got  to  be  wicked.  I've  never  done 
anything  wicked  in  my  life,  and  I'd  often 
wanted  to  know  what  it  would  feel  like.  And  if 
I'm  doing  something  wicked  now,  it  feels  very 
good — that's  what  it  feels.  And  I  don't  won- 
der at  people  going  on  being  wicked." 

They  heard  at  that  time  distinctly  a  voice 
say,  "Hallo,  aunt!"  from  the  stairs. 

Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed,  "That's  the  major!" 
and  positively  she  turned  pale.  She  ran  out  in 
the  passage,  and  coming  back  with  the  major 
following  her,  she  burst  out:  "I  do  hope  you 
find  everything  you  want,  Edward.  Miss  Jen- 
kins,  here  ..." 

But  Miss  Jenkins  was  not  in  the  room,  al- 
though, as  far  as  Mrs.  Foster  could  remember, 
she  had  not  passed  them  on  the  staircase. 

The  major,  who,  being  an  Irishman,  knew 
exactly  how  to  please  all  women,  took  a  long 
look  round  the  bedroom. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  81 

"Well,  it's  a  jolly  old  room,"  he  said,  "and 
large  enough  for  the  officers  of  a  whole  regi- 
ment to  sleep  in.  And  that's  what  I  like." 
And  he  added  cheerfully,  "Are  there  any  ghosts 
about?" 
■  Mrs.  Foster  said:  "You  know  your  uncle 
and  I  don't  hold  with  ghosts.  It's  not  a  mod- 
ern belief  at  all." 

"Well,  well!"  the  major  said  cheerfully.  "I 
guess  you  can't  hold  with  them  when  they  come 
whether  you  ask  them  or  not." 

Mrs.  Foster's  old  butler  was  bringing  in  the 
major's  things  one  by  one.  Mrs.  Foster  shiv- 
ered a  httle. 

"Oh,  dear  Brent!"  she  said — "I'm  going  to 
call  you  Brent,  instead  of  Edward,  so  as  to 
keep  you  in  remembrance  of  the  name  you 
changed.  But,  oh,  my  dear  Brent,  don't  talk 
to  me  about  ghosts  and  things.  It  makes  me 
nervous  in  this  queer  old  house.  Your  uncle 
doesn't  hold  with  ghosts,  but  I  know  he's  ner- 
vous, walking  about  the  dark  corridor.  It's 
only  Olympia  who  keeps  us  all  in  our  places." 

The  major  said:  "Oh,  poor  Olympia!  How's 
her  dog?" 

Mrs.  Foster  stiffened  in  the  very  slightest.  "I 
am  bound  to  say,"  she  exclaimed,  "that  her  dog 
is  a  very  troublesome  little  animal.  It  snaps  at 
everybody  in  the  house,  even  your  uncle." 


S2  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"And  the  funny  thing  is/*  the  major  said, 
"that  the  little  beast  has  taken  such  a  fancy  to 
me.  Of  course,  I  bought  it  for  her,  but  that 
isn't  a  reason  why  it  should  love  me,  and  not 
her.  When  I  saw  it  in  the  shop  in  Seven  Dials, 
it  seemed  to  me  exactly  the  sort  of  animal  to 
be  the  proper  protector  for  a  maiden  lady — I 
mean,  of  course,  before  I  had  any  idea  of  mar- 
rying Olympia." 

"So  you  gave  it  to  her,"  the  aunt  asked,  "be- 
fore you  were  engaged?" 

"Oh,  yes,"  the  major  said  innocently.  "That 
was  what  gave  her  the  idea,  when  she  saw  that 
the  little  beast  was  always  running  after  me. 
She  said  that  she  knew  I  couldn't  be  wholly 
bad."  He  seemed  to  be  on  the  point  of  sigh- 
ing, and  then  he  said  briskly: 

"Anyhow,  it*s  a  jolly  old  place,  and  you're  a 
jolly  old  woman,  and  we're  going  to  have  a 
jolly  old  time,  and  if  some  jolly  old  ghosts  turn 
up,  that  will  make  it  all  the  jollier." 

Mrs.  Foster  said:  "I  don't  know  about  that, 
my  dear;  there  are  said  to  be  ghosts  to  this 
family.  But  their  records  are  most  disreputable 
— women  as  well  as  men " 

The  major  let  out  lightly:  "Oh,  well,  they 
won't  disturb  me." 

But    Mrs.    Foster    exclaimed:    "My    dear,    I 


RING  FOR  NANCY  83 

don't  like  to  hear  you  talk  like  that.  Disre- 
putableness  is  always  a  painful  thing  to  hear 
of,  even  though  it  may  have  taken  place  hun- 
dreds of  years  ago." 

The  major  exclaimed:  "Yes,  I  alv^ays  used 
to  wonder  that  they  let  us  read  the  Book  of 
Kings  at  school.  But,  anyhow,  if  there  aren't 
any  ghosts,  I  hope  youVe  got  some  sliding 
doors  and  secret  panels  on  top." 

"I  don't  know,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  and  she 
gazed  rather  apprehensively  at  the  fierce  man 
on  the  large  panel.  "I  shouldn't  wonder  if 
there  were  dozens.  From  the  way  Miss  Jen- 
kins vanished  just  now,  it  wouldn't  in  the  least 
surprise  me  if  there  were  a  secret  door  into 
this  very  room."  She  looked  again  at  the  pic- 
ture. "But  some  of  the  doings  of  those  gen- 
tries," she  said,  "were  such  that  no  modern 
person  would  care  to  contemplate." 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  the  major  said; 
and  then  he  asked:  "Who  have  you  got  stop- 
ping here,  old  woman?  I  know  there's  Olym- 
pia;  and  Flossie  Delamare  and  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  came  down  with  me  in  the  train.  But 
who  are  the  rest  of  your  rum  old  menagerie?" 

"I'd  have  had  Lady  Savylle,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said,  "but  she's  not  coming  down  for  a  fort- 
night   or    so.      And    then    she's    going    to  the 


84  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Dower  House.  She  wouldn't  stop  with  us, 
though  we  told  her  that  it  was  her  own  house 
if  we  did  pay  her  rent  for  it." 

The  major  exclaimed:  "Lady  Savylle?  Lady 
Savylle,  of  Higham?  This  is  her  house?  My 
God,    why   didn't    I    remember?" 

"Of  course  you  know,"  Mrs.  Foster  said, 
with  a  little  note  of  triumph  in  her  voice,  "Hig- 
ham itself  passed  to  the  Duke  of  Rothbury  in 
1842.  Lady  Savylle  has  only  inherited  this 
house  and  about  two  thousand  acres." 

Mrs.  Foster  was  a  little  triumphant  because 
she  had  remembered  at  least  this  detail. 

The  old  butler  had  opened  up  the  major's 
portmanteau  and  unpacked  most  of  the  articles 
from  his  kit-bag,  and  just  at  that  moment  he 
noiselessly  withdrew. 

"My  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "I  think  it's 
about  time  that  we  had  a  little  explanation." 

"I  think  it's  just  about  it,  old  woman,"  the 
major  said. 

"Of  course,  I'm  only  a  stupid  old  person," 
Mrs.   Foster  began. 

"Of  course,  of  course,"  the  major  said  affec- 
tionately. 

"I  never  took  any  prizes  at  school,"  she  con- 
tinued, "and  I  don't  suppose  I  ever  shall  now. 
But  when  you  went  away  like   that,   and  dis- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  85 

appeared,  your  uncle  said  that  you  had  prob- 
ably gone  to  lead  the  idle  and  dissolute  life  of 
an  army  officer." 

''Well,  so  I  had,  so  I  had,"  the  major  said 
amiably.  "Three  shillings  a  day,  and  be  your 
own   dustman." 

"But  I  knew  better,"  his  aunt  continued, 
"and  when  you  didn't  answer  our  letters  I  just 
asked  and  asked.  I  don't  mean  to  say  that  I 
put  detectives  on  you,  my  dear,  but  I  just 
asked  and  asked  everywhere.  Whenever  I 
heard  of  people  coming  home  from  India,  I 
either  got  introduced  to  them  somehow  or  I 
just  simply  invited  them  to  dinner,  without 
knowing  them,  which  was  easy,  as  your  uncle 
was  a  Common  Councilman.  I  asked  and 
asked.  If  there  wasn't  any  other  way  of  doing 
it,  I  just  told  them  that  I  was  anxious  for  news 
about  you,  and  nobody  was  rude  to  me,  even 
though  I  didn't  know  them.  W^hy,  I  even  went 
to  the  old  Duke  of  Cumberland  and  asked  him 
what  there  was  between  you  and  that  Mary 
Savylle,  who's  now  the  Lady  Savylle,  of  Hig- 
ham." 

"There  were  six  thousand  miles  between  us," 
the  major  said  grimly. 

"And  I  got  to  know  ten  or  a  dozen  officers, 
and  one  of  them  was  an  old  Colonel  Sax  of  your 


86  RING  FOR  NANCY 

regiment,  and  they  all  said  you  were  working 
very  hard.  And  Colonel  Sax  said  you  weren't 
a  very  brilliant  officer,  but  a  regular  good 
plodder." 

*'Well,  that  was  kind  of  Colonel  Sax,"  the 
major  said. 

"And  then,"  Mrs.  Foster  continued,  "I  came 
upon  Miss  Flossie  Delamare,  and  afterward 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  and  then  I  knew  that  the  sort 
of  women  you  picked  up  were  quite  the  nicest 
sort  of  women." 

"The  devil  you   did!"   the   major   exclaimed. 

"And  I  knew,  or  I  supposed  you  were  just 
working  up  to  get  Lady  Savylle,  and  I  hoped 
and  prayed  you  would.  That  I  did,  when  I 
heard  how  good  you'd  been  to  Miss  Delamare 
and  paid  her  passage  back.  And  I'm  sure  you 
had  to  go  to  those  dreadful  Indian  money- 
lenders to  do  it,  and  you  had  to  suffer  for  it 
afterward.  And  then  you  went  to  Somaliland 
and  I  lost  track  of  you,  until  I  saw  in  the  mili- 
tary information  in  The  Times,  that  you  were 
ordered  home.  And  then  I  saw  in  the  'Army 
and  Navy  Gazette  about  your  brilliant  examina- 
tion, and  that  same  day  you  sent  Olympia  to 
me  and  she  told  me  that  you  were  going  blind. 
And  then  I  knew  that  you  would  never  have 
your    Mary    Savylle,    after    all    the    way    you'd 


RING  FOR  NANCY  87 

worked  and  suffered  in  that  sun  and  that  hor- 
rible dusty  place,  and  then  .  .  ."  The  major 
sank  down  in  a  long  deep  armchair  before  the 
fire. 

"Olympia  was  exaggerating,"  he  said.  "I 
wasn't  going  blind.  I  was  only  pipped  for 
active  service.  And  I  wasn't  engaged  to  Olym- 
pia.     I  never  even  thought  of  it." 

"She  said,"  Mrs.  Foster  said  vindictively, 
"that  it  was  practically  certain  to  come,  and 
she  showed  me  that  horrid  little  dog  that  you 
had  given  her,  and,  oh,  my  boy,  my  boy,  I  knew 
you'd  given  up." 

"Oh,  you  mustn't  say  that  about  a  man,"  the 
major  said,  "who  was  just  going  to  get  en- 
gaged to  a  charming  lady.  That's  the  begin- 
ning of  life,  that  isn't  chucking  up  the  sponge." 

"But  she  isn't  your  sort,  she  isn't  your  kind; 
she  isn't  meant  to  make  you  happy,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter almost  wailed.  "And,  oh,  I  was  desperately 
unhappy,  and  I  took  a  stern  determination. 
Yes,  I  did,  a  determination.  I  just  set  my 
teeth  and  I  said:  *My  boy  shall  have  a  good 
time  now,  if  he  never  did  in  his  life.'  And  I 
said  I'd  get  the  best  house  I  knew  in  England 
for  him  to  spend  his  last  days  of  freedom  in. 
And  I  ordered  in  the  best  wines  and  the  best 
cigars,  at  twelve  guineas  a  hundred — though  it 


SS  RING  FOR  NANCY 

was  Miss  Jenkins  who  chose  them,  and  she 
said  they  were  the  kind  you  used  to  smoke  at 
Thorbury." 

"But,  I  say,  old  woman,"  the  major  said, 
"who  is  Miss  Jenkins?  And  why  did  you 
choose  this  house  of  all  the  houses  in  the 
world?" 

A  look  of  real  triumph  charmed  in  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter's eyes. 

"Ah!"  she  exclaimed.  "I  said  to  myself,  'If 
Edward  is  going  to  live  in  prison  for  the  rest 
of  his  life,  I'm  going  to  let  him  see  his  old 
friends  for  the  last  time.'  And  so  I  asked  Miss 
Delamare  and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  because  they 
seemed  so  fond  of  you,  and  I  was  perfectly  de- 
termined that  I  would  get  Lady  Savylle,  too. 
And  I  thought  of  that  plan  of  getting  her 
ladyship  to  let  me  this  house,  because  I 
thought  it  was  sure  to  be  full  of  portraits  of 
her,  and  remembrances  of  her.  And  I  was  de- 
termined to  ask  her  ladyship  to  be  good 
enough  to  come  and  stop  with  us  while  we 
were  here,  because  you  would  be  the  son  of 
the  house." 

"I  say,  old  woman,"  the  major  said,  "that 
was  an  awfully  rum  thing  to  do." 

"Well,  I  did  it,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "I  wrote 
to  her  ladyship  in  exactly  those  words.     I've 


1 


RING  FOR  NANCY  89 

never  seen  her  herself,  but  she  answered  kindly 
that  she  couldn't  come  and  stop  with  us  .  .  ." 

The  major  said:  "Ah!'' 

"But  that  she  would  leave  her  own  maid  to 
help  settle  us  in,  and  that  she  would  be  coming 
to  stop  at  the  Dower  House  just  at  the  end  of 
the  garden  next  week."  Mrs.  Foster  paused  to 
take  breath. 

"So  there  you  are,"  she  said;  "you  will  have 
your  old  friends  and  your  old  wine  and  your 
old  cigars,  and  there  are  six  of  the  best  horses 
that  could  be  got  from  Whiteleys'.  And  I 
forced  your  uncle  to  agree  to  it  all,  for,  I  said, 
if  he  didn't,  I  would  take  my  money  out  of  the 
business.  For  my  father  saw  to  it  that  all  my 
money  was  settled  on  me,  under  trustees,  with 
the  permission  to  your  uncle  to  use  it  as  capi- 
tal, and  I  said  I  would  take  all  my  money  out 
and  come  and  live  down  here  with  you.  For  he 
and  I  have  lived  together  twenty-five  years, 
and  I  don't  see  why  we  shouldn't  separate  now. 
I  don't,  for  Fve  had  a  great  deal  to  put  up 
with,  though  I  shouldn't  like  anybody  else  to 
hear  it.  .  .  .  And  then  your  uncle  said  quite 
mildly  that  he  didn't  see  anything  against  the 
scheme,  and  that  he'd  long  thought  of  making 
you  his  heir,  because  we  were  childless,  and  he 
knew  Fd  like  to  adopt  you.     But  that  was  only 


m  RING  FOR  NANCY 

what  he  said.  It  was  really  Olympla's  doing. 
She  can  twist  him  round  her  little  finger.  They 
sit  and  hold  confabulations  together  by  the 
hour,  leaving  me  quite  out  in  the  cold.  And  it 
was  she  who  got  your  uncle  to  make  you  his 
heir." 

"Well,  you  can  hardly  blame  her  for  that, 
old  woman,"  the  major  said  mildly. 

"She  didn't  do  it  for  you,"  Mrs.  Foster  ex- 
claimed, "she  did  it  to  get  the  money  for  her- 
self. But  I  said  that  if  you  were  going  to  have 
all  that  money,  you  must  change  your  name  to 
Foster,  for  it  only  seemed  just." 

There  was  quite  a  long  pause,  and  then  the 
major  said: 

"Well,  old  woman,  you  don't  often  break  out, 
but  when  you  do  ruzzle  round,  you  certainly  do.  \ 
It's  an  extraordinary  rum  collection  you've  got  j 
together." 

"Oh,  Teddy,  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed  on 
a  note  of  anguish,  "I  do  hope  there's  nothing 
wrong.  I  do  hope  there's  nothing  you  don't 
like." 

"Oh,  there's  nothing  wrong,"  the  major  said. 
"It's  only  just  queer."  He  got  up  from  his 
chair  and  put  both  his  hands  heavily  and  affec- 
tionately on  his  aunt's  shoulders.  "You  know, 
old  woman,  you  do  get  the  most  extraordinary 


fc 


RING  FOR  NANCY  91 

ideas  into  that  head  of  yours.  It's  all  most  in- 
genious jumble.  But  if  you'd  got  a  large  barrel 
of  gunpowder  and  knocked  its  head  off  and  put 
half  a  dozen  barrels  all  round  it,  and  then 
stuck  a  lighted  candle  in  the  naked  powder — 
well,  you  couldn't  have  more  ingeniously  in- 
cited a  little  plot  for  a  jolly  big  explosion.  Ex- 
cept, of  course,  that  I  am  a  reformed  char- 
acter." 

*'Oh,  Teddy,"  Mrs.  Foster  said  plaintively, 
"I  do  hope  you  don't  mean  to  set  the  house  on 
fire  by  smoking  in  your  bedroom  and  I  do  hope 
much  more  that  you  aren't  going  to  be  a  re- 
formed character  until  you  marry  Olympia. 
Your  uncle  has  forced  me  to  be  the  president 
of  a  society  for  the  suppression  of  sin,  but  I  do 
hope  and  pray  that  you  enjoy  yourself  here 
after  all  the  trouble  I've  taken  to  make  things 
nice  for  you." 

"Oh,  it's  all  right,  old  woman,"  the  major 
said.  "I'm  going  to  have  the  time  of  my  life; 
but  I  guess  one  can  enjoy  one's  self  without 
sinning." 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  very  dubious. 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  she  said,  and  the 
major  shook  her  with  his  laughter  because  he 
still  had  his  hands  on  her  shoulders. 

You  do  have  the  rummiest  old,  funniest  old 


92  RING  FOR  NANCY 

ideas  Tve  ever  heard  of,"  he  said.  "And  youVe 
the  most  courageous  old  plotter  I  ever  met. 
,You  don't  fear  and  you  do  what  you  want,  and 
you   don't   care   about   the   consequences!" 

**I  don't  know  that  I  do — much,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said.    "I'm  beginning  to  think  that  I  don't." 

The  major  said:     "Oh,  come,  old  woman!" 

"I  don't,  and  I  don't,  and  I  don't,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter exclaimed.  "I'm  going  to  do  what  I  think 
is  right  and  proper,  and — and  hang  the  conse- 
quences.    That's  what  you'd  say,  isn't  it?" 

The  major  recoiled  a  full  step  from  his  rela- 
tive and  stood  transfixed,  holding  out  his  arms 
before  him. 

"In  spite  of  your  uncle  and  in  spite  of  your 
Olympia,  who  is  a  Wesleyan  Episcopal,"  Mrs. 
Foster  said  slowly,  with  an  air  of  fiendish  deter- 
mination, "while  we  are  in  this  house  we — are 
— all  going  to  church  on  Sundays." 

The  major  exclaimed:   "By  gum!" 

"We  shall  go  there,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "out 
of  deference  to  Lady  Savylle  and  to  set  the 
tenants  a  good  example." 

"But  if  you're  .  .  ."  the  major  said  slowly, 
"if  you're  what  you  are  in  fact,  surely  it  isn't  a 
good  example  to  go  to  church." 

"I  don't  care,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "It's  a 
sign  to  them  that  you  are  master  of  this  house. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  93 

You  would  not  like  the  other  thing;  it  is  not 
what  youVe  been  used  to.  Besides,  it  would  be 
against  true  hospitality  to  use  Lady  Savylle's 
house  in  order  to  spread  a  form  of  belief  that 
her  ladyship  would  not  approve  of." 

**0h,  I  don't  believe  Mary  would  care  a 
button." 

"Well,  that's  enough  about  that,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter said.  And  then  to  change  the  subject  she 
asked,  after  a  long  pause: 

"My  dear,  did  you  know  Lady  Savylle  very 
well?" 

"Well  .  .  ."  the  major  said.  "Oh,  yes,  very 
well."  And  his  manner  seemed  to  shut  in  as  if 
he  had  snapped  his  lips  together. 

"But  tell  me  just  one  thing,"  Mrs.  Foster 
pleaded.     "You  were  engaged  to  her.  .  .  ." 

"Yes,  for  three  days,"  the  major  said  in  a 
short  tone.  "I'd  only  known  her  a  fortnight. 
There,  there,  that's  enough." 

"If  you'd  only  told  me !  If  you'd  only  told 
me!"  Mrs.  Foster  almost  wailed.  "If  you'd 
only  told  your  uncle !  He  would  have  made  it 
all  right.  He  would  have  seen  that  you  were 
in  earnest  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  chuck  it,  old  woman!"  the  major  said. 
"I  tell  you,  I  won't  talk  about  it.  It  would 
have  been  a  pretty  way  to  show  that  I  was  in 


94  RING  FOR  NANCY 

earnest,  just  to  marry  a  girl  who  might  be 
coming  into  a  title.  If  that's  earnestness,  damn 
it,  I  say." 

"But  it  might  have  meant  a  seat  for  the 
County,"  Mrs.  Foster  pleaded.  "That  was  how 
your  uncle  looked  at  it,  after  the  duke  had 
very  kindly  told  me  he  thought  you  were  en- 
gaged to  the  young  lady, .  but  he  couldn't  be 
sure." 

The  major  said:  "There,  there,  that  will  do." 

"You  know  how  strong  a  Nonconformist 
Unionist  your  uncle  is,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "He 
would  have  made  any  sacrifices  for  the  party 
or  to  get  you  into  it." 

"Oh,  I  know  what  my  uncle  is,"  the  major 
said;  "the  blessed  Unionist  party  is  a  thing  no 
decent  man  would  stand  for,  because  of  people 
like  him  and  his  sacrifices.  You're  a  good  sort, 
but  he's  a  confounded  prig,  and  a  tuft-hunter — 
and  unsuccessful  at  that.  He  never  gets  a 
chance  to  bow  down  to  his  boots  to  an  honor- 
able's  third  son,  except  at  some  charity  func- 
tion. He  wanted  me  to  marry  money  or  a  title 
to  show  I  was  an  orderly  member  of  society. 
I  wouldn't  do  it  then.  I'm  doing  it  now,  be- 
cause my  spirit  is  broken;  I'm  used  up.  Done. 
I  go  out.  I'm  marrying  Olympia  for  her 
money — that's    the    dirty    truth,    and    I'm    not 


RING  FOR  NANCY  95 

proud  of  it.  You  know  he  would  throw  me 
over  to-morrow  if  she  threw  me  over.  So,  I 
shall  behave  so  that  she  will  not  throw  me 
over — and,  of  course,  I'll  do  my  best  to  give  her 
a  good  time.     That's  my  duty,  and  I'll  do  it." 

In  moments  of  agitation  the  major  spoke  like 
one  of  his  sergeants.  He  finished  with,  "There, 
there,  there!"  And  then  he  began  again  agi- 
tatedly: "I  tell  you,  I'm  tired!  Used  up!  I 
must  have  comfort,  quiet!  I  can't  stodge  away 
any  more.  God  knows  I've  done  enough  to 
get  it — and  it  hasn't  all  been  any  good.  Worse 
than  useless!  Worse!  If  I  hadn't  sweated  so 
hard,  I  should  be  in  a  better  position!  I'd  have 
had  better  eyes — that  would  mean  more  money ! 
That's  what  it  comes  to!  I  slogged  like  that 
for  Mary — upon  my  word,  just  for  Mary! 
We  could  have  got  along  on  a  major's  pay,  out 
there.  Just  got  along!  And  then  the  blasted 
girl  goes  and  gets  rotten  titles  and  moldy 
houses  to  her  back  on  the  day  the  bottom  drops 
out  of  me.  The  very  black,  beastly,  blighted 
day  .  .  ." 

In  her  turn  Mrs.  Foster  said:  "There,  there, 
there !" 

"That  very  same  hateful  day,"  he  raved  on. 
And  then  he  fixed  his  aunt  with  a  glaring  gaze. 

"Look  here,"  he   said,   "don't  think  that  I'm 


96  RING  FOR  NANCY 

not  young  enough  to  enjoy  a  good  time — and 
to  deserve  it.  God  knows  I  can  laugh  like  an- 
other, and  lark  above  most.  Young!  I'm  the 
youngest  major  in  the  British  army,  for  the 
rotten  twopence  halfpenny  that  it's  worth! 
And  consider  the  time  that  IVe  had.  The  long 
evenings  with  nothing  to  do;  and  the  beastly 
dust  going  pink  in  the  sunsets,  and  the  nigger 
johnnies  sitting  eating  dough  under  the  wilted 
palm-trees — and  everything  stinking  of  paraffin, 
and  some  sort  of  beastly  animal  yap,  yap,  yap- 
ping away  from  the  filthy,  blistering,  low  hills! 
Why,  I've  got  the  feel  of  it  in  my  bones,  and 
not  all  the  iced  wine  of  Champagne,  and  not 
all  the  kisses  that  were  ever  kissed  by  a  hun- 
dred women,  could  wash  it  out  again.  Wine! 
Kisses!  I've  drunk  lukewarm  pale  ale,  and  I 
could  have  screamed,  mad  ghut,  and  run  amuck 
in  the  native  quarters.  .  .  ."  He  stopped  and 
looked  at  his  aunt.  "There,  there,  old  woman," 
he  said,  "that's  how  it  feels.  But  don't  you 
worry.  I'll  be  shocking  Olympia,  so  that  it 
tickles  her  and  makes  her  good  all  over  to- 
morrow! What  you  feel  in  your  bones,  don't 
show  in  your  face." 

His  aunt  reflected  a  moment. 

"Yes,  yes,  that's  what  Olympia  likes!"  she 
said.     "That's  the  fascination.     You  can  shock 


RING  FOR  NANCY  97 

her,  and  she  thinks  that  you  are  bold  and  dash- 
ing and  dangerous — and  that  she's  got  you, 
and  can  trust  you." 

"Well,  she  has,"  the  major  said.  "And, 
please  God,  she  can." 

Again  Mrs.  Foster  remained  reflective  for  a 
long  minute.     And  then  she  asked  slowly: 

"Then,  it  is  true  that  a  man  can  remain  faith- 
ful to  a  woman  for  a  long  time — for  ten  years 

"Eight  years,  nine  months,  and  a  week,"  the 
major  said.  "And  only  saw  her  once  for  four- 
teen days.  Yes,  it's  true  enough.  But  what's 
there  wonderful  in  that?" 

"It's  what  every  woman  really  wants  to 
know,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "and  she  hasn't  ever 
really  any  chance  of  knowing." 

"Oh,  well,"  the  major  said  rather  tiredly,  "it's 
so.  It's  certainly  so,  but  looking  at  the  matter 
from  the  inside,  as  I've  got  to  do,  I  can't  see 
that  it's  anything  particularly  wonderful  or 
romantic,  or  even  particularly  meritorious.  It's 
something  just  funny,  rather  than  anything 
else." 

"I  can't  see  how  it's  funny,"  Mrs.  Foster  said; 
"you  might  say  that  it  was  sad,  or  sorrowful, 
or  something." 

"Then   that  would  just   make   it  grotesque," 


98  RING  FOR  NANCY 

the  major  said.  "And  I  dare  say  it  is  grotesque 
— a  mixture  of  the  sorrowful  and  the  funny. 
See  here,  I  don't  mean  to  say  that  I  spent  my 
whole  time  sighing  about  Mary  Savylle,  or 
that  I  hung  for  hours  over  her  photograph.  I 
didn't!  I  haven't  got  a  photograph;  I  lost  it  be- 
fore I  got  as  far  as  Aden,  and  I  cut  a  photo- 
graph of  somebody  like  her  out  of  an  illustrated 
paper,  and  it  used  to  stand  on  my  writing-table 
in  quarters,  until  I  got  sick  of  it  and  chucked 
it  into  the  Ganges.  No,  I  didn't  sigh;  perhaps 
I  didn't  sigh  once  in  ten  years.  I'm  not  the 
sighing  sort,  anyhow.  But  it  was  like  ...  it 
was  like.  .  .  ."  The  major  paused  and  cast  about 
in  his  mind  for  an  illustration.  "It  was  like 
being  always  slightly  thirsty,  or  having  a  very 
slight  touch  of  indigestion  all  the  time." 

"Oh,  my  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  expostulated. 

"Well,  that  is  what  it  really  was  mostly 
like,"  the  major  said,  "but  I'll  withdraw  it  if  it 
shocks  you.  It  was  something  that  spoilt 
everything;  that  took  the  edge  off  everything. 
I  don't  mean  to  say  that  I  never  looked  at  an- 
other woman.  There  wasn't  even  anything  in 
honor  to  bind  me  not  to.  No  engagement.  It 
was  just  broken  off.  She  never  even  wrote  to 
me,  because  her  confounded  old  great-uncle 
said  that  if  she  did  he  would  cut  off  her  allow- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  99 

ance,  which  was  all  she  had  to  live  on,  and  of 
course,  she  wasn't  the  sort  to  do  it  in  secret. 
I  shouldn't  have  wanted  it.  She'd  just  gone 
right  out  of  my  existence.  I  never  heard  from 
her,  I  never  heard  of  her.  Just  gone !  Dropped 
down  an  infernal  deep  well. 

"And  that's  what  I  mean  by  saying  that  it 
took  the  edge  off  things.  Of  course,  you  un- 
derstand that  the  only  thing  that  is  really  in- 
teresting to  a  young  man  is  young  women. 
That  is  a  heart  talk,  so  you  needn't  be  shocked. 
And  there  wasn't  any  woman  that  came  along 
that  interested  me  in  the  least.  Not  one  that 
made  by  pulse  beat  in  the  least  quicker.  Of 
course  I  talked  to  'em;  and  of  course  I  larked 
with  them.  I'm  not  Irish,  I  suppose,  for  noth- 
ing. But  that  was  just  it — they  didn't  interest 
me.  I  had  to  cover  up  yawns  sometimes,  in 
the  midst  of  the  larkiest  of  larks.  That  sort 
of  thing." 

"That's   what   I   call   love,"    Mrs.    Foster    said. 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  the  major  answered; 
"of  course,  if  you're  satisfied,  you're  satisfied. 
But  I  don't  want  to  pose  as  a  sentimental  char- 
acter. If  any  other  woman  had  come  along 
that  did  interest  me " 

"But  no  one  could  have,"  Mrs.  Foster  said. 
"There  wouldn't  be  one  in  the  world." 


100  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Oh,  that's  probably  sentimental  gap,"  the 
major  retorted;  "you  are  a  silly  old,  senti- 
mental old  woman.  It's  absurd  that  in  the 
millions  and  millions  there  are,  there  shouldn't 
have  been  one  that  couldn't  make  me  forget  a 
tomboy  that  I  had  only  seen  for  three  weeks 
in  my  whole  life,  and  been  engaged  to  for  three 
days.  Supposing  that  it  was  the  look  in  the  eye 
that  did  it,  and  the  high  instep,  and  the  swing- 
ing walk  of  the  creature  that  she  was — do  you 
mean  to  tell  me — supposing  that  that  was  what 
I  was  looking  for — that  I  shouldn't  have  found 
the  same  look  and  the  same  voice,  and  the  same 
way  the  black  hair  of  her  curled,  in  a  thousand 
others?  The  doctrine  of  chances  forbids  it. 
If  there's  a  chance  of  a  million  to  one  against 
it,  aren't  there  about  five  hundred  million 
women  in  the  world?" 

"Then  you  never  looked  for  one,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter said. 

"Oh,  you  rotten,  sentimental  old  ass,"  the 
major  addressed  his  aunt.  "I  dare  say  you've 
got  at  the  truth  of  it.  I  never  did  look  for 
one.  But  don't  you  go  running  away  with  the 
idea  that  that  was  love.  It  wasn't.  It  was  a 
sort  of  selfishness.  It  was  like  this.  I  felt' 
that  my  job  in  life  was  to  make  myself  the  sort 
of  career  that  would  lit   me   to  pick  up  with 


RING  FOR  NANCY  101 

Mary  again.  Don't  you  understand?  I  plod- 
ded and  stodged  for  just  that,  and  nothing  else. 
That  was  why  when  on  the  same  day  the  bot- 
tom fell  out  of  me,  and  Mary  jumped  up  in 
the  social  scale  as  if  she'd  been  a  balloon  that 
you'd  let  go  the  ropes  of,  I  just  proposed  right 
away  to  Olympia.  It  wasn't  love;  it  wasn't 
morals  or  faith;  it  was  just  want  of  interest 
and  selfishness." 

"Now,  you  can  say  what  you  like,  my  dear 
Edward,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "Fm  not  a  very 
clever  woman,  but  I  can  tell  a  great  A  from  a 
bull's  foot.  But  that's  the  sort  of  love  that 
any  sensible  woman  would  want  to  get  hold  of. 
It  isn't  your  ramping,  tearing,  raging,  obstrep- 
erous sort  of  young  man  that  any  woman  in 
her  senses  would  want,  as  they  say  in  the  poem 
that  I  never  can  remember  the  words  of,  but 
it's  something  about  the  burden  of  my  song, 
though  what  that  means  I  haven't  the  least 
idea  of.  But  you'll  want  to  be  getting  to  bed, 
and  not  stopping  talking  to  an  old  woman  like 
me,  who  goes  on  and  on  talking  about  one  and 
the  same  thing.  But  there's  one  thing  I  would 
like  to  tell  you,  because  it  was  my  very  own 
idea.  There'll  be  lots  of  people  that  you  know 
coming  down  in  a  day  or  two — all  the  people 
that   I   told  you   I'd   picked   up   because    they 


I 


102  RING  FOR  NANCY 

knew  you,  and  your  uncle's  cook  is  famous 
throughout  the  city.  But  what  I  want  to  tell 
you  is,  sometimes,  as  I  dare  say  you've  heard, 
rather  unpleasant  things  happen  in  these  large 
country  houses." 

"Oh,  I've  heard  it  all  right,"  the  major  said. 
"Well,"  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed  triumphantly, 
"with  the  help  of  Miss  Jenkins,  who  knows  the 
house  from  roof  to  cellar,  I've  arranged  that 
all  the  men — the  gentlemen — sleep  in  one  wing 
of  the  house,  and  all  the  ladies  in  the  other." 

Again  the  major  ejaculated:     "My  God!" 

"Of  course  it's  a  little  confusing — the  house 
is,"  his  aunt  continued.  "At  any  rate,  there 
are  the  dining-room  and  the  breakfast-room, 
and  a  whole  lot  of  halls  and  oflfices  in  between 
the  two  wings.  That  is  to  say,  they  are  not 
rightly  two  wings.  If  I  understand  the  ar- 
rangement, they  are  really  back  to  back.  But 
at  any  rate  the  sexes  are  separated.  Don't  - 
you  think  it's  splendid?"  i 

"Oh,  splendid!  splendid!"  the  major  said; 
"and  you  are  the  most  dangerous  old  inflam- 
matory I've  ever  come  across." 

His  aunt  smiled  rather  complacently. 

"My  dear,"  she  said,  "when  a  woman  comes 
to  my  age  there's  a  certain  change  comes  over  | 
her.    God  knows  I've  been  a  good  wife  to  your 


RING  FOR  NANCY  103 

uncle.  But  when  a  man's  sixty  he  looks  forward 
to  retiring — so  does  a  woman,  and  I'm  over 
sixty.  I've  looked  after  your  uncle's  house; 
I've  lived  up  to  the  standard  of  your  uncle's 
requirements,  whether  in  morals  or  what  they 
call  customs — or  is  it  conventions?  And  pre- 
cious foolish  many  of  his  morals  and  customs — 
or  if  it's  conventions,  then  conventions — have 
seemed  to  me,  often  and  often.  But  now  the 
time  has  come  when  I  mean  to  do  what  pleases 
me,  and  what  seems  right  to  me.  I  don't  mean 
to  say  that  I  should  have  done  it  if  you  hadn't 
introduced  that  Olympia  into  this  house — but 
if  your  uncle  can  be  influenced  by  one  woman, 
he's  got  to  do  what  another  wants — and  that 
one's  me — or  else  he's  got  to  do  without  her." 

The  major  said:  *'0h,  dear,  I  do  hope 
Olympia  hasn't  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  I  don't  mean  anything  of  that  sort," 
Mrs.  Foster  answered.  "Your  uncle  always 
must  have  some  one  to  philander  with  in  his 
silly  complimenting  manner,  which  reminds 
me  of  an  old  sheep  trying  to  make  love  to  a 
chicken.  A.nd  when  it  was  a  matter  of  Flossie 
Delamare,  I  didn't  mind.  For  she's  a  dear, 
good,  bright  little  thing,  and  deserves  all  she 
gets,  and  it's  a  great  comfort  to  me  to  know 
her,  for  she  does  bring  a  little  brightness  into 


104  RING  FOR  NANCY 

my  life.  And  I  don't  mind  if  your  uncle  builds 
her  a  dozen  theaters  as  long  as  he  can  afford 
it.  And  I  wish  it  was  her  you  were  marrying, 
for  I've  often  thought  of  adopting  her. 

"And  I  don't  really  object  to  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe,  though  she  has  rather  pushed  her  way 
into  the  house,  and  some  of  her  opinions  are 
.  .  .  well,  I  haven't  got  any  words  for  them. 
Still,  I  don't  object  to  her,  because  she  does 
pay  me  the  attention  of  reading  her  books  to 
me,  and  very  pretty,  if  not  quite  proper,  some 
of  them  are.  But,  when  it  comes  to  Olympia 
— why,  she  treats  me  all  the  time  as  if  she 
were  a  shop-walker  trying  to  tell  me  that  I 
don't  know  tulle  from  nun's  veiling — which  is 
the  most  insulting  thing  that  can  happen  to 
one.  But  there,  there,  you've  had  enough  of 
me.     Good  night." 

"I  say,  wait  a  minute,"  the  major  said. 
"Where  does  that  beastly  dog  of  poor 
Olympia's  sleep?" 

Mrs.  Foster  answered:  "On  the  door-mat 
outside  her  door.  She  says  that  she  can  not 
sleep  if  the  dog  isn't  somewhere  near,  and  at 
the  same  time,  it's  unhealthy  to  have  an  ani- 
mal sleeping  in  your  bedroom." 

"Oh,  I  know,  I  know,"  the  major  groaned. 
"It  was  like   that   at  Gordon   Square.     And   in 


RING  FOR  NANCY  105 

the  middle  of  the  night  the  horrid  little  animal 
will  come  whining  and  scratching  at  my  door, 
and  then  poor  dear  Olympia  will  discover  that 
her  dog  isn't  outside  her  door.  And  she'll  come 
to  find  the  dog,  and  I  shall  have  to  get  up 
and  invent  loving  speeches  through  the  door 
at  four  in  the  morning." 

"Oh,  I  don't  think  that  either  the  dog  or 
Olympia  could  find  their  way  through  all  these 
dark,  old,  winding  corridors,  that  I'm  almost 
afraid  to  go  along  myself,"  Mrs.  Foster  said, 
and  she  shivered  a  little. 

"That  only  shows,"  the  major  answered, 
"that  you  don't  know  either  of  them.  They'll 
come  all  right,  for  all  you've  separated  the 
sexes  so  neatly." 

Mrs.  Foster  caught  at  that  moment  the  eye  of 
the  fierce  dark  man  in  the  panel,  and  she  dis- 
appeared quickly  into  the  terrors  of  the  corri- 
dors,  calling  over  her  shoulder: 

"Well,  you've  had  enough  of  me/* 


IV 

^TpHE  major  shut  his  door,  and  then  remained, 
-*■  pottering  round  his  room,  making  mut- 
tering exclamations  at  what  he  saw — the  fire- 
dogs,  the  great  fireplace,  the  immense  bed,  the 
walls  hung  with  dark  tapestry.  Then  he  came 
back  to  the  fireplace,  and  standing  before  it  he 
quoted  aloud: 

"So  that  there,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  we 
all  are." 

He  sauntered  over  to  the  large  mahogany- 
washing-stand,  and  exclaimed  over  that: 

"Hullo,  no  hot  water!  Poor  aunt  always  did 
have  the  worst  servants  in  Christendom."  Then 
he  pulled  a  long  strip  of  embroidery  that  hung 
at  the  side  of  the  fire  and  sat  down  to  await 
the  servant.  He  did  not  even  take  off  his  coat, 
for  he  supposed  the  servant  would  be  a  woman, 
and  he  disliked  any  woman  to  see  him  in  his 
shirt.  It  seemed  to  be  disrespectful  to  them. 
He  sat  in  his  armchair  with  his  back  to  the 
panel,  just  thinking  and  thinking.  And  sud- 
denly he  said: 

"Well,  there  aren't  going  to  be  any  more 
106 


RING  FOR  NANCY  107 

cakes  and  ale — that's  flat."  He  heard  a  slight 
knock  from  somewhere  and  sat  still  looking  at 
the  door.  And  then  quite  distinctly,  but  very 
softly,  he  heard  from  behind  his  back  some- 
thing that  sounded  like  his  name:  "Teddy 
Brent."  He  really  jumped  quite  out  of  his 
chair,  and  seeing  just  behind  his  chair  the  figure 
of  a  maid  in  cap  and  apron,  he  exclaimed  almost 
violently : 

"Hullo,  who  the  devil  are  you?  What  do 
you  mean  by  springing  up  like  that?'* 

"I  came  in  through  the  little  door  behind 
the  hangings,"  the  servant  said.  "That  is  the 
door  her  ladyship  likes  us  to  use,  because  her 
ladyship  dislikes  seeing  us  about  the  corri- 
dors, sir." 

She  spoke  very  stiffly  and  correctly,  with  her 
eyes  on  the  floor,  and  she  added:  "What  did 
you  please  to  want,  sir?" 

"Oh,  hang  it  all,"  the  major  said,  "you  don't 
come  into  a  man's  room  and  startle  him  out  of 
his  seven  senses  by  calling  him  Teddy  Brent, 
and   then   ask   him  what   he   pleases   to   want." 

"I'm  very  sorry,  sir,"  the  maid  said.  "It 
slipped  out,  sir,  along  of  my  being  her  lady- 
ship's own  maid  and  having  served  her  so  long, 
sir."  She  spoke  very  low,  distinctly  and  very 
levelly,  like  the  most  perfect  of  servants,  and 


108  RING  FOR  NANCY 

the  major  exclaimed — for  he  felt  confused  and 
stupid: 

"Not  so  many  sirs.  I  know  I  am  your  social 
superior  without  being  reminded  of  it  every 
three  words." 

The  maid  suddenly  laughed,  and  then  she 
said  quickly: 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,  it  slipped  out,  sir. 
It's  because  I'm  so  glad  for  her  ladyship,  sir, 
that  you've  come  back,  sir.  It's  made  me  a 
little  hysterical.  I  can't  help  it,  sir,  remem- 
bering so  well  the  old  days  at  Holbury,  sir, 
nine  years  ago  and  more.  What  did  you  please 
to  want,  sir?" 

The  major  stood  looking  at  her  with  a  puz- 
zled expression.  His  slight  doze  in  the  arm- 
chair had  muddled  him.  Suddenly  he  moved  up 
close  to  her  and  said: 

"What  I  want,  desperately,  is  to  kiss  you, 
and  that's   the   truth." 

She  moved  precisely  two  steps  back. 

"That  couldn't  have  been  what  you  wanted 
when  you  rang,  sir." 

The  major  sank  down  once  again  into  his 
chair. 

"It's  extraordinary,"  he  said,  "but  she  couldn't 
have  had  the  cheek  to  try  It  on.  No  one 
could."     And  then  he  added  regretfully:  "Oh, 


RING  FOR  NANCY  109 

well,  I  am  a  reformed  character,  when  it's  all 
said  and  done." 

Her  ladyship's  own  maid  interjected:  "Yes, 
sir,"  interrogatively. 

And  the  major  said  irritably:  "Oh,  drop 
those  sirs.  They  get  on  my  nerves.  It's 
enough  to  make  one  believe  you're  not  a  ser- 
vant at  all.     I  never  knew  one  to  use  so  many." 

"Well,  you're  the  odd  gentleman,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins said  calmly.  "If  you  would  please  to  tell 
me  what  you  want.  .  .  .  I'm  sure  her  lady- 
ship would  give  me  a  character  as  long  as  her 
life,   pretty  nearly,   sir." 

"I  don't  believe  you're  a  day  older  than  Lady 
Savylle,"  the  major  said.  "You  can't  have 
been  her  nurse,  so  don't  try  to  make  me  believe 
it.     .What's  your  name?" 

Miss  Jenkins,  who  had  been  standing  with 
her  hands  at  her  sides,  clasped  them  behind 
her. 

"I  was  born  on  the  same  day  as  her  lady- 
ship," she  said,  "and  I'm  sure  I've  tried  to  be 
a  faithful  servant  to  her  all  my  life.  My  name 
is  Nancy  Jenkins,  called  after  the  Lady  Nancy 
Savylle  that  was  her  ladyship's  grandmother." 

The  major  remained  glaring  moodily  in  front 
of  him. 

"Oh,  I  see,  I  see,"  he  said  at  last;  "a  sort  of 


110  RING  FOR  NANCY 

foster-sister — that's  what  they  call  it,  isn't  it?" 

Miss  Jenkins,  with  her  eyes  upon  the  ground, 
said:     "As  you're  pleased  to  say  so." 

The  major  immediately  became  filled  with 
compunction.  "Oh,  I  really  beg  your  pardon," 
he  said,  "I'm  afraid  I've  been  too  inquisitive. 
A  foster-sister,  of  course !" 

Miss  Jenkins   said   calmly: 

"Oh,  there's  no  occasion  at  all,  sir.  It  isn't 
a  painful  question  at  all  as  far  as  I  know." 

"Then  that's  all  right,  that's  all  right," 
Major  Foster  said  cheerfully.  "I  think  I  under- 
stand." He  recovered,  indeed,  all  his  usual 
calmness  of  demeanor.  He  remained,  however, 
silent  for  a  moment,  and  Miss  Jenkins  re- 
marked : 

"Her  ladyship  has  left  me  in  the  house  here 
to  see  that  the  tenants  don't  break  the  heir- 
looms." 

The  major   said: 

"Yes,  yes,  very  proper,  very  proper,  I'm  sure. 
So  you  were  at  Holbury.  And  you  recognize 
me!     I  never  noticed  you." 

"One  doesn't  notice  one's  social  inferiors  very 
much,  sir,"  Miss  Jenkins  said,  "but  I  should 
have  recognized  you,  sir,  anywhere.  That's 
what  startled  me  a  little  when  I  came  into  the 
room." 


"What    I    want,    desperately,    is   to   kiss   you" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  111 

The  major  said:  ''Yes,  yes;  and  what  about 
her  ladyship?     Has  she  changed  much?" 

"You  would  better  know  than  I,  sir,"  Miss 
Jenkins  said.  "I'm  too  much  with  her  to  be 
able  to  notice  changes,  but  I  shouldn't  say  her 
ladyship  has  changed  much." 

The  major  said: 

"Well,  when  you  see  her,  tell  her  that  I 
haven't  changed  at  all.  Only  tell  her  that  I 
had  the  rottenest  time  any  chap  ever  had,  and 
tell  her  that  I'm  having  a  rotten  time  now,  and 
that  I  don't  expect  to  get  any  better." 

He  was  looking  full  at  the  girl's  face.  Her 
lips  were  very  red,  and  he  was  almost  certain 
that  they  never  moved;  nevertheless,  he  was 
almost  certain  that  she  said,  "Poor  fellow!'* 
And  he  exclaimed  sharply:  "What's  that?" 

Miss  Jenkins  said:  "I  didn't  say  anything, 
sir." 

And  he  added:  "I  thought  you  said,  'poor 
fellow.'  " 

Miss  Jenkins  said :  "I  shouldn't  be  so  familiar, 
sir.  From  being  so  much  with  her  ladyship 
I'm  perhaps  more  familiar  than  I  should  be,  but 
I  shouldn't  be  so  familiar  as  that,  sir." 

"Oh,"  the  major  said,  "I  am  a  poor  fellow, 
so  I  shouldn't  mind  it  much.  A  reformed  char- 
acter, that's  what  I  am." 


112  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Oh,  I  hope  not,"  Miss  Jenkins  said.  "It 
would  disappoint  her  ladyship.  And  you  did 
try  to  kiss  me." 

"Oh,  what's  that?"  the  major  said  despond- 
ently. "It's  almost  a  duty  to  kiss  a  servant. 
It's  not  like  trying  to  kiss  your  equal,  but  it's 
not  likely  to  be  found  out.  Don't  you  see,  the 
whole  thing  about  being  a  reformed  character 
consists  in  doing  things  that  aren't  likely  to  be 
found  out." 

Miss  Jenkins  said: 

"Oh,  I  didn't  know,  sir.  At  any  rate,  no 
gentleman  has  tried  to  kiss  me  as  a  matter  of 
duty.     Not  since  Holbury,  sir." 

"Do  you  and  her  ladyship  live  in  an  asylum 
for  the  blind?"  he  asked;  and  she  answered: 

"Thank  you,  sir,  no,  sir,  I  live  here  with  her 
ladyship.  We  don't  see  many  gentlemen  at 
all,  sir." 

"Oh,  I  say,"  Major  Foster  exclaimed  with 
real  concern,  "I  hope  Mary  isn't  a  reformed 
character.  I  hope  she's  had  a  good  time.  It 
would  be  too  rotten  if  we  both  of  us  muffed 
our  lives." 

"Oh,  she  lives  as  she  pleases,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said,  "but  it  doesn't  include  men  who  want  to 
kiss  me." 

The  major  looked  at  her  seriously.     "I  don't 


RING  FOR  NANCY  113 

like  to  hear  that,"  he  said.  ''She  ought  to 
marry." 

"Ah,  well,  she's  like  me,"  Miss  Jenkins  com- 
mented.    "She  doesn't  take  stock  in  men." 

The  major  stood  up  in  front  of  the  fire. 
**Ah,  well,"  he  said,  with  a  slight  sigh,  "that's 
the  different  way  it  takes.  She  hasn't  run 
after  men — for  my  sake;  and  I've  run  after 
women — for  her  sake — if  you  understand  me." 

"Yes,  yes,  I  think  I  understand,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins said.  "You  meant  to  get  her  out  of  your 
head." 

Major  Foster  said  quickly:  "Oh,  it  wasn't 
only  that.  It  was  hardly  that  at  all.  I  wanted 
to  get  myself  out  of  her  head.  I  thought  if  I 
came  a  holy  mucker  she  would  come  to  hear  of 
it,  and  that  would  sicken  her  of  me  and  so  she'd 
forget."  He  was  not  looking  at  her  at  that 
moment,  and  yet  he  was  perfectly  certain  that 
she  said,  "Poor  fellow,"  when  he  accused  her 
of  it. 

"Why,  so  I  did,  sir,"  she  said.  "Don't  you 
see  that  if  you'd  come  a  hundred  and  fifty 
muckers  her  ladyship  would  have  understood 
it  was  her  fault,  and  only  cared  for  you  all  the 
more.     Besides,  you  didn't  come  any  mucker." 

"Oh,  that's  only  what  they  call  the  grace  of 
God,"  the  major  said. 


114  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Miss  Jenkins  looked  at  the  floor.  "If  you'd 
kindly  tell  me  what  you  pleased  to  want." 

The    major    said    explosively: 

"Oh,  shut  up !  I  won't  tell  you  what  I  want. 
I  want  to  kiss  you,  I  want  to  hear  about  Mary, 
I  want  .  .  ." 

"But  you're  a  reformed  character,  sir,"  Miss 
Jenkins  reminded  him.  "You're  engaged  to 
Miss  Peabody." 

"Oh,  poor  Olympia!"  the  major  said.  "Look 
here,   does  Mary  talk  about  me  much?" 

Miss  Jenkins  said  briefly:  "Her  ladyship 
never  mentioned  your  name." 

"Then  how  do  you  know "  the  major  was 

beginning.  | 

"Oh,  I  know,  if  it  isn't  presumptuous  of  me 
to  say  so,  when  her  ladyship  is  thinking  of 
you." 

"Look  here,"  the  major  said  suddenly,  "I 
suppose  I'm  an  awful  nuisance  to  you.  But  if 
you  could  find  any  use  for  a  fiver  .  .  ." 

Miss  Jenkins  put  her  hands  behind  her  back. 
She  smiled  suddenly  with  a  sort  of  gay  malice. 

"Her  ladyship  doesn't  allow  me  to  take  tips. 
But  if  you  give  me  that  half  threepenny  bit, 
sir  .  .  ." 

The  major  said  "What?"  in  a  really  appalled 
voice.     "Give  you?  .  .  .  What's  that?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  115 

Miss  Jenkins  looked  him  hardly  in  the  eyes. 
**If  you'll  give  it  to  me  you  may  kiss  me,"  she 
said. 

"I  am  damned  if  I  will,"  he  said.  "I  don't 
know  how  you  come  to  know  about  that.  I 
suppose  Lady  Savylle  told  you.  But  I'm  par- 
ticularly damned  if  I  do  anything  of  the  sort." 

**I  don't  believe  you've  got  it,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said.  "I  believe  you've  given  it  to  Miss  Pea- 
body  or  Miss  Delamare  or  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe." 

The  major  fumbled  irritably  inside  his  collar. 

"You're  a  sort  of  impertinent  blackmailer," 
he  said.  "But  I  suppose  if  you  don't  see  it 
you'll  tell  her  ladyship  that  I've  given  it  away." 

"I  should  certainly  be  inclined  to  do  so,  sir," 
Miss  Jenkins  said  calmly.  With  a  sawing 
sound  a  little  gold  chain  came  up  above  the 
major's  collar,  and  upon  the  chain,  a  very  small 
gold  locket  into  which  there  fitted  visibly  a 
threepenny  bit.     "There!"  he  exclaimed. 

Miss  Jenkins  leaned  forward  to  look  at  it. 
"You  may  kiss  me  now,  if  you  like,"  she  really 
murmured. 

But  the  major  exclaimed:  "No,  certainly  not, 
certainly  not." 

"Well,  you  may  kiss  me  and  think  it's  her," 
Miss  Jenkins  said. 

"That   would   be   nonsense,"    the    major   an- 


116  RING  FOR  NANCY 

swered.  "I  don't  think  I  like  you  at  all.  I 
think  you've  a  bad  character,  even  for  a  serv- 
ant." 

"Then  I'd  better  go,"  Miss  Jenkins  said. 
"Good  night,  sir,"  and  she  was  turning;  back 
toward  the  little  door. 

"But,"  the  major  exclaimed,  "here,  hang  it 
all,  wait  a  minute,  I  want  you  to  talk  about 
her  ladyship."  I 

"There  is  nothing  more  to  tell,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said.  "Besides,  it  isn't  right.  You're  engaged 
to  Miss  Peabody." 

"You've  only  just  remembered  that"  the 
major  exclaimed.  I 

"I  wish  I  hadn't  got  it  to  forget,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins retorted.     "But  it's  too  late.     I  must  go." 

"Oh,  look  here,"  the  major  said,  "stop  and 
talk.  I  feel  lonely.  I'm  not  a  bit  sleepy.  I  am 
afraid  of  the  ghosts." 

Miss  Jenkins  said:  "Oh,  get  along,  sir." 

"Now  don't  talk  like  a  servant,"  the  major 
said.  "You've  been  talking  like  a  lady.  You 
know  all  about  this  old  place?"  | 

Miss  Jenkins  answered:  "I  know  just  about 
as  much  as  Lady  Savylle  does.  Of  course, 
she's  only  owned  it  about  six  months.  But 
she's  just  soaked  herself  in  it  until  you  might 
say  it  was  part  of  herself." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  117 

^"Well,    then,    look    here,"    the    major    asked, 
iren't    there    ghosts    here?      And    secret    doors? 
nd  sHding  panels?" 
"There's  the  little  door  I  came  in  by,"  Miss 
}  Jenkins  said.     "That  used  to  be  a  secret  door 
i  for   priests   to   escape   by,   but   it   leads   to   the 
I   servants'   quarters;   and   then  there's  the   panel 
between  this  room  and  the  next.     That's  quite 
secret.     You  see,  if  anybody  wanted  to  escape 
and  the  pursuers  were  in  this  wing,  he  would 
just  slip  through  the  panel  and  shut  it  again, 
and  out  of  another  secret  door  that's  in  Miss 
Delamare's  room,  and  they'd  have  to  run  the 
whole    length    of    a    house    before    they    could 
catch  him.     It's  one  of  the  most  ingenious  and 
complete  systems  of  secret  paneling  that  there 
is  in  the  kingdom,  and  her  ladyship  has  had  it 
completely  repaired  so  that  it  runs  on  castors." 
The   major   said:   "A   panel.     In   this   room? 
Where  is  it?" 

"Well,  of  course,  it's  the  picture,  sir,"  Miss 
Jenkins  said.  "It  stands  to  reason  that  a  bed- 
room is  an  out-of-the-way  place  to  put  a  picture 
by  Van  der  Burg  in.  Especially  when  it  is  a 
very  valuable  picture  of  the  second  earl  and 
his  family — unless  there's  special  reason  for  its 
being  there." 

"Oh,  it's  that?"  the  major  asked. 


118  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Miss  Jenkins  walked  deliberately  up  to  the 
picture,  and  scrutinizing  the  large  carved  frame, 
she  put  her  finger  on  the  corner  of  a  wooden 
leaf. 

"If  you  press  this  place,  just  beside  the  elec- 
tric light  switch,"  she  said,  "the  panel  will  slide 
back  into  the  wall  and  let  you  right  into  the 
next  room." 

"That  would  be  rather  a  lark,"  the  major 
said.     "Where  did  you  say  it  exactly  was?"       i 

Miss  Jenkins  had  turned  back  into  the  room 
and  was  going  toward  the  little  door.  She 
looked  back  over  her  shoulder  and  said: 

"It  would  let  you  into  Miss  Flossie  Dela- 
mare's  room,  sir." 

The  major  sank  back  into  his  armchair 
again. 

"Oh,  heavens!"  he  exclaimed;  "then  don't 
show  me.  Don't  tell  me.  I  don't  want  to  know 
anything  about  knobs  and  things.  Go  away. 
Go  away  quickly.  It's  most  improper  your 
being  here,  and  I  wouldn't  mind  betting  half  a 
crown  that  Olympia  will  be  here  in  a  minute  or 
two." 

"Well,  I'm  glad  you've  thought  of  that  at 
last,  sir,"  Miss  Jenkins  said. 

"I  don't  mind  saying,"  the  major  confessed, 
"that   Miss   Olympia  is   particularly  jealous   of 


RING  FOR  NANCY  119 

attractive  servants.  We're  only  going  to  have 
men  when  v^e  are  married." 

Miss  Jenkins  disappeared  under  the  dark 
hangings,  and  again  the  major  was  perfectly 
certain  that  she  said: 

"Oh,  poor  fellow!" 


/^NCE  again  the  major  was  left  to  potter 
^^  about  his  room  and  to  think.  And  once 
more  he  exclaimed  to  himself  that  there,  in 
a  manner  of  speaking,  they  all  were,  only, 
that  the  deuce  of  the  matter  was  that  he 
couldn't  in  the  least  tell  in  any  manner  of  speak- 
ing where  in  the  world  it  was  that  they  could 
be  said  to  be,  and  he  certainly  hadn't  got  any 
hot  water,  and  he  knew  that  he  would  go  with- 
out it,  for  he  was  pretty  certain  that  that  young 
lady  wouldn't  answer  his  bell  again. 

He  was,  therefore,  just  beginning  to  take  off 
his  coat  when,  with  a  little  click,  the  electric 
lights  went  out,  and  he  grumbled  vigorously 
that  it  was  only  in  a  house  tenanted  by  his 
aunt  that  you  could  be  certain  of  having  no 
water,  and  equally  certain  of  having  no  light. 

The  fire  had  rather  died  down,  so  that  it  was 
pretty  darkish  as  he  strolled  across  the  room 
in  a  brown  study  and  stretched  his  hand 
toward  the  switch.  He  couldn't  for  the  life  of 
him  make  up  his  mind  whether  Miss  Jenkins 
was    the    second   woman    in    the    four    hundred 

120 


RING  FOR  NANCY  121 

million,  or  whether  she  wasn't  as  he  put  it, 
something  altogether  too  preposterously  impos- 
sible— that  she  could  possibly  be.  It  had  af- 
fected him  like  something  impossible,  really  as 
if  he  had  seen  a  ghost. 

He  was  looking  at  Miss  Flossie  Delamare. 
There  wasn't  the  least  doubt  that  he  was  look- 
ing at  Flossie.  She  was  in  a  peignoir  that  was 
a  foam  of  pink.  She  was  standing  with  her 
back  to  a  dressing-table  that  was  covered  with 
shining  things.  She  was  just  saying  good  night 
to  somebody  who  had  just  gone  out  of  the 
room,  and  she  looked  exactly  like  a  rather  small 
Olivia  out  of  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield.  The  walls 
were  all  covered  with  a  pink-flowered  chintz, 
the  hangings  of  the  four-post  bed  were  all  of 
pink-flowered  chintz,  and  so  were  the  curtains 
and  the  valances  over  the  long  windows.  It 
was  an  extraordinary  effect,  as  if  it  had  been 
sunlight;  it  was  as  if  he  had  stepped  right 
straight  out  of  the  gloom  of  the  seventeenth 
century  bang  into  the  eighteenth.  The  panel 
had  just  gone;  noiselessly  upon  its  castors  it 
had  disappeared,  and  Major  Edward  Brent  Fos- 
ter found  himself  explaining  to  himself  that 
now  he  could  understand  why  Mary  Savylle 
treasured  her  house  enough  to  leave  her  own 
maid  behind  her  when  it  contained  such  perfect 


I 


122  RING  FOR  NANCY 

treasures  of  old  rooms,  for  over  the  high  white 
mantelpiece  there  was  an  undoubted  Gainsbor- 
ough— a  gentleman  in  a  bright  red  coat  point- 
ing his  finger  to  distant  cannon  fire. 

But  he  hadn't  the  least  hesitation  about  ad- 
vancing into  the  room  and  exclaiming: 

"Here,  I  say,  for  goodness'  sake,  Flossie,  lend 
me  one  of  your  candles  and  let  me  find  that 
blessed  knob  again.'' 

Miss  Delamare's  eyes  became  rather  wide, 
and  she  exclaimed: 

"Teddy  Brent,  by  all  that's  wonderful!" 

"Oh !"  the  major  exclaimed.  "Why  don't  you 
say,  'Teddy  Brent,  by  all  that's  damnable?' 
You've  got  to  remember  that  my  respectable 
name  is  Foster  now,  and  that  I  am  a  reformed 
character." 

"Well,  I  didn't  ask  you  to  come  into  my  bed- 
room, Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  said,  with  a 
slightly  injured  air.  "I  don't  object  to  your 
being  here.  But  I  didn't  ask' you.  Your  aunt's 
just  gone,  I've  been  sitting  talking  to  her,  or 
goodness  knows  what  dreadful  things  you 
mightn't  have  seen." 

"Well,  lend  me  a  candle,"  the  major  said. 

"But  what's  it  all  about?"  Miss  Delamare 
asked.  "You  don't  surely  come  into  a  lady's 
room  at  a  quarter  past  twelve  and  ask  her  for 
a  candle?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  123 

"I  do,"  the  major  exclaimed.  "Don't  you 
understand  there's  a  sliding  panel  between  these 
rooms?  And  I  touched  the  knob  by  accident, 
and  I  can't  get  it  shut."  And  the  major  dis- 
appeared once  more  and  began  to  fumble  with 
the  frame  of  the  picture. 

Miss  Delamare  came  delicately  across  the 
room  bearing  one  of  her  candles,  and  looked  in 
upon  the  major. 

She  said  maliciously:  "I  say,  Teddy,  aren't 
you  going  to  admire  my  new  dressing-gown? 
Aren't  you  going  to  kiss  me,  or  anything? 
Don't  you  remember  Simla  and  the  pucka 
drives?" 

The  major  recoiled  from  the  frame,  and  his 
shadow  w^ent  dancing  all  over  the  walls  and  the 
ceiling  of  his  room.  "Don't  you  come  into  this 
room!"  he  said.     "Don't  you  dare  to!" 

"Teddy''  Miss  Delamare  said,  "what's  the 
matter  with  you?" 

The  matter  with  me,"  the  major  said  grimly, 
is  that  I'm  engaged  to  marry  Miss  Olympia  Pea- 
|ody." 

'Oh,    Teddy,"    she    said    woefully,    "I    knew 

m  were  going  to  marry  some  one  pretty  awful 

-but  that  old  mummy!  Oh,  Teddy,  that's 
flaying  it  too  low  down." 

The  major  said:  "Well,  I'm  not  proud  of  it. 
But  I've  got  to  get  this  panel  shut." 


124  RING  FOR  NANCY 

".Well,  it  doesn't  look  as  if  you  could,  Teddy," 
Miss  Delamare  said  amiably.  "You'd  better 
let  me  come  in  and  try.  Men  aren't  a  bit  of 
good  at  that  sort  of  thing."  And  she  came  into 
his  room  and  set  the  candle  down  on  his  dress- 
ing-table. 

The  major  moved  away  from  the  frame  as  if 
he  were  afraid  of  her. 

"I  don't  believe  you  can  do  anything,"  he 
said  gloomily.  "And  what  will  poor  Olympia 
say  if  she  hears  it's  found  open  in  the  morn- 
ing?" 

"Oh,  I  guess  she'll  have  some  pretty  sweet 
things  to  say,"  Miss  Delamare  said,  with  her 
back  to  him  and  slightly  abstractedly,  because 
she  was  feeling  along  the  heavily  carved  frame 
for  the  knob.  The  frame  was  perhaps  a  foot 
and  a  half  broad,  of  carved  wood  representing 
an  inextricable  tangle  of  bunches  of  grapes, 
roses    and  thistles. 

"The  servant  said,"  the  major  continued, 
"that  it  was  just  beside  the  Hght  switch." 

The  picture  was  there  in  its  place.  Noise- 
lessly, and  as  if  in  a  procession  they  had  been 
drawn  along  on  a  car,  the  three  fierce  men,  the 
three  bare-shouldered,  mild,  blond  women  and 
the  children,  occupied  their  places  and  looked  | 
dim  in  the  light  of  Miss  Delamare's  candle. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  125 

"Well,  it  isn't,"  Miss  Delamare  said;  "it's  a 
full  foot  above  the  switch." 
{     The    major,    who    had    sprung   back    at    the 
]  ghostly  arrival  of  the  panel,  now  sprang  for- 
ward. 

"Hang  on  to  it!"  he  exclaimed.  "For  good- 
ness' sake  hang  on  to  it,  or  we  shall  be  caught 
like  rats  in  a  trap.  That  thing  is  the  very- 
devil!" 

"All  right,  I'm  hanging  on,"  Miss  Delamare 
said,  appearing  as  if  she  were  nailed  to  the  wall 
by  one  white  raised  hand.  "But  it  really  isn't 
necessary.  It's  this  knobby  thistle  thing  that 
does  the  trick." 

"Then  for  goodness'  sake,"  the  major  re- 
peated, "do  the  trick  and  get  back  to  your  room 
and  shut  it  after  you,  and  let's  have  a  night's 
rest." 

"All  right,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  repeated 
in  her  turn;  "but  you  might  give  me  a  minute 
or  two,   I   do   think." 

"Not  a  minute,  not  a  second,"  the  major 
answered  hotly.  "It's  too  dangerous.  .We  can 
talk  to-morrow." 

"No,  we  can't,  Teddy,"  she  answered.  "Your 
Olympia — you  should  just  have  seen  her  face 
when  your  aunt  introduced  me  to  her  as  your 
very    oldest,    dearest,    darlingest    friend — your 


126  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Olympia  will  jolly  well  see  to  that.  No  more 
talks  for  us." 

"But  it  would  give  my  aunt  her  death  if  you 
were  found  here,"  the  major  pleaded. 

"I  don't  believe  it  would,"  she  said.  "Your 
aunt's  too  sensible  for  that.  But  I'll  go,  if  it's 
for  her  sake.  I'm  hanged  if  I  would  if  you'd 
mentioned  the  other  woman  again!"  She 
moved  her  wrist  on  the  frame. 

"By  Jove,  Teddy,"  she  said,  "I'm  wiggling 
the  button  thing  up  and  down  for  all  I  am 
worth,  and  the  old  panel  thing  doesn't  move  a 
step." 

The  major  stepped  agitatedly  toward  her, 
and  she  continued:  "It  isn't  a  thing  you  press; 
you  click  it  up  and  down  like  a  switch.  Here, 
you  have  a  try." 

With  a  face  full  of  a  sort  oi  awe  the  major 
began  clicking  the  thistle-like  knob,  interjecting 
from  time  to  time:  "Oh,  hell!"  And  with  the 
awe  intensified  he  looked  around  upon  Miss 
Delamare. 

"It — won't — move,"  he  exclaimed  slowly. 

Miss  Delamare  seated  herself  comfortably  in 
his  armchair  and  kicked  off  her  shoes.  She 
extended  her  stockings  to  the  fire. 

"Oh,  go  on  wiggling,  I  can  wait,"  she  said. 

The  major  set  his  face  to  the  wall,  first  on 


RING  FOR  NANCY  127 

one  side  of  the  knob  and  then  on  the  other. 
He  pulled  out  his  penknife  and  tried  to  remove 
what  he  thought  might  be  some  dirt  from  the 
workings  of  the  thistle  shank. 

"I  believe  the  clockwork's  run  down,"  Miss 
Delamare  said.  "It  must  work  by  a  spring,  or 
it  couldn't  be  so  quiet.  Don't  you  be  too  vio- 
lent or  you'll  break  the  whole  blessed  thing, 
and  then  we  shall  be  in  the  cart." 

The  major  tried  pressing  and  tried  pulling. 
He  drew  out  his  handkerchief  and  wiped  his 
forehead,  and  then  he  ran  his  nails  along  the 
edge  of  the  picture  itself. 

"You  can  kiss  me  if  you  like,  Teddy,"  Miss 
Delamare's  voice  came  to  him  mockingly. 
"Then  it  would  be  quite  like  old  times." 

The  major  repeated:  "Oh,  hell!" 

"No,  I  didn't  say  anything  so  nasty,"  Miss 
Delamare  continued  to  mock  him.  "I  said  you 
could  kiss  me.     Don't  you  remember  Simla?" 

The  major  was  fumbling  in  his  kit-bag  for 
a  little  oil-can  he  always  carried  with  him. 

"No,  I  don't,"  he  said.  "I  don't  want  to. 
I'm  not  going  to."  He  paused  to  recover  his 
breath.  "Look  here.  There's  no  cause  to  open 
that  panel  again.  You  just  get  out  of  my  room 
by  the  usual  way."  And  at  a  very  slight  shake 
of  Miss  Delamare's  head  he  went  on:  "I'll  give 


128  RING  FOR  NANCY 

you  a  pearl  necklace  if  you'll  go  quietly — one  I 
bought  for  poor  Olympia.'* 

Again  Miss  Delamare  shook  her  head. 

"I'd  like  to  do  that  Yankee  in  the  eye,"  she 
ejaculated.  "But  if  you  think,  Major  Edward 
Brent  Foster,  late  of  His  Majesty's  One  Hun- 
dred and  Twenty-sixth  Regiment,  that  I'm  go- 
ing to  walk  all  along  these  old  corridors  in  the 
dark  and  black  beetles  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  rot!"  the  major  said.  "You  used  to 
walk  all  over  Simla  in  the  dark." 

"But  not  black  beetles,  Teddy,"  Miss  Dela- 
mare exclaimed. 

"Up  the  Bazaar  and  along  the  Chota  Hazri 
Drive  and   King  William  Street — everywhere." 

"You're  remembering  Simla  now,  Teddy," 
Miss  Delamare  said  softly. 

"I  don't  want  to,  but  IVe  got  to,"  the  major 
conceded,  "for  the  sake  of  argument.  .  .  ." 

And  then  Miss  Delamare  said  softly  and  as- 
tonishingly: ''Poor  fellow!" 

The   major   really  jumped. 
"Don't  say  that!"  he  ejaculated.    "That's  what 
Mary's  housemaid  said!" 

"Well,  you  are  a  poor,  poor  fellow,"  Miss 
Delamare  corroborated.  "Did  ums  want  its 
old  friend  out  of  its  little  bedroom?" 

"Yes,  I  do,"  the  major  said  frankly.     "Look 


RING  FOR  NANCY  129 

here,  Flossie,  do  the  decent  thing  and  quit.  I 
don't  beHeve  I'm  very  well.  I've  had  a  sort  of 
message  from — from  Mary  Savylle.  You  heard 
me  speak  of  her  in  Simla.'' 

"Oh,  /  don't  remember  Simla!"  Miss  Dela- 
mare  said,  with  a  toss  of  her  head.  "And  so 
this  Alary  Savylle?" 

"I  don't  know,"  the  major  said.  "She  hasn't 
married.  .  .  .  But  just  trot  away,  there's  a  good 
chap.  I'll  kiss  you  and  give  you  the  pearl  neck- 
lace, too." 

Miss  Delamare  jumped  out  of  her  chair  and 
faced  him  in  her  stockinged  feet. 

"Who  wants  your  old  kisses  and  who  wants 
your  pearl  necklaces?"  she  exclaimed.  "Keep 
them  for  Olympia  Peabody,  and  joy  go  with 
them." 

She  moved  toward  the  door  and  then  turned 
to  say: 

"I  was  never  the  one  to  come  between  a  man 
and  his  fair  and  blushing  bride.  I  don't  want 
to  spoil  sport.  I  wish  you  all  the  joy  you  can 
get.  ALL!"  She  paused,  and  then  she  added: 
"But  you  may  kiss  me  if  you  want  to,  Teddy." 

The  major  looked  at  her  and  then  at  the  fire. 

"I  don't  really  think  I  want  to,  Flossie,"  he 
said  slowly.  "I  don't — I  don't  believe  I  can 
be   very  well." 


i 


130  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Oh,  well,  Teddy,"  she  said,  with  a  remon- 
strating voice,  *'don't  talk  to  me  as  if  you  were 
seasick  and  I  were  a  pork-chop.  Just  say 
you've  seen  the  girl  you  really  like  again. 
Don't  put  it  as  if  I  didn't  look  good  to  kiss. 
That  would  damage  my  professional  chances. 
The  other's  only  a  matter  of  my  heart." 

"Oh,  lord,  no,"  the  major  said.  "You're  a 
sweet  good  brick — a  lump  of  nougat — and  the 
prettiest  girl — the  prettiest  girl — only — I  just 
want  to  get  a  chance  to  think  .  .  ." 

Miss  Delamare  said  "Poor  fellow!"  again, 
and  the  major  said: 

"Don't  say  that,  I  don't  like  it,"  again  in  a 
really  appealing  voice;  and  he  added:  "Go 
away  as  quietly  as  you  can." 

"All  right,  Teddy,"  she  answered.  "I'm  in 
my  stockinged  feet  and  I  shan't  ring  a  fire-bell. 
I  don't  in  the  least  know  whether  I  can  find 
my  way,  but  I  guess  I'll  get  in  somewhere  all 
right." 

For  the  third  time  the  major  fell  into  his 
armchair,  but  this  time  he  exclaimed:  | 

"No,  I  can't  see — even  though  Flossie  doesn't  ^' 
add  anything  to  the  problem  at  all — I  can't  see 
in   any  imaginable   manner  of  speaking  where 
we  all  .  .  ." 


VI 

'T^HERE  came  a  knock  upon  his  door — 
-■-  quite  a  loud  knock — and  he  started  for- 
ward in  his  low  chair  and  sat  listening,  with 
his  right  hand  almost  on  the  floor. 

"That'll  be  Olympia!  If  she's  seen  Flossie 
going  .  .  ."  The  knocking  was  repeated  more 
determinedly,  and  he  called,  "Come  in,"  because 
he  imagined  that  Olympia  would  not  really  care 
to  come  into  his  room.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  came 
in. 

She  was  in  a  purple  Japanese  kimono  with  a 
swallow  worked  in  gold  thread  over  each  breast, 
and  a  great  roll  and  bow  at  the  back,  her  maid 
having  learned  how  to  put  kimonos  on  in  Tokyo. 
She  tripped  in — and  her  smallness  gave  a  cer- 
tain Japanese  air  of  littleness,  resignation  and 
obedience — and  remarked: 

"I  said  we  must  have  an  explanation  before 
to-morrow  morning.  I've  come  for  it."  And 
she  sat  herself  down  on  the  edge  of  the  arm- 
chair facing  the  major's  and  looked  at  him. 
The  contrast  between  her  appearance  and  her 
mental  attitude  always  surprised  the  major  so 

131 


132  RING  FOR  NANCY 


1 


much — he  was  always  expecting  some  sort  of 
soft  fluffiness  to  come  out  somewhere — that  he 
simply  gave  up  the  situation.  He  let  drop  any 
attempt  to  understand  and  to  control  it  with 
the  words: 

"I'm  simply  too  flabbergasted  to  be  able  to 
try  to  explain  anything.  I  couldn't  explain  the 
theory  of  lateral  strains  in  bridges.  And  there 
seem  to  be  ten  or  a  dozen  women  determined 
to  go  after  me  here.  I  never  knew  such  a 
place.  It's  like  being  mad."  And  suddenly  he 
really  felt  a  sort  of  glad  madness — he  couldn't 
imagine  that  he  was  not  at  least  going  to  get 
some  fun  out  of  it. 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said:  "Well,  I'm  glad  you 
feel  some  remorse." 

"Oh,  it's  not  exactly  remorse,"  he  answered 
almost  gaily.  "It's  like  having  indigestion  very 
badly.  So  that  you  can't  eat  with  ten  dishes 
that  you'd  hke  to  eat  very  much  just  under 
your  poor  nose." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said  contemptuously:  "I 
suppose  you  think  that  I  am  one  of  the  ten 
or  a  dozen.  It's  like  you  to  regard  yourself 
as  the  Grand  Turk!" 

"It's  like  you,  Juliana,"  the  major  said,  "to 
say  polygamous  things  of  that  sort.  I  wish  I 
just  felt  like  that." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  133 

"No  doubt  you  do,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said 
with  an  even  deeper  note  of  determination. 
''But  I'm  going  to  have  my  explanation.  There 
was  not  time  in  the  train  because  I  wanted  to  get 
my  play  settled  about.  And  from  what  I've 
seen  of  Miss  Peabody — ^your  aunt  introduced 
me  to  her  as  your  oldest,  best  and  most  affec- 
tionate friend,  so  she's  prepared  for  what's 
coming — from  what  Fve  seen  of  the  lady  I 
don't  imagine  she  will  leave  us  much  time  to- 
gether to-morrow.     So  it  has  got  to  be  now." 

*'But,  my  dear  Juliana,"  the  major  said, 
''I'm  a  reformed  character!" 

*T  don't  in  the  least  understand  you,"  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  said;  "I  haven't  asked  you  to  do 
anything  but  your  simple  duty." 

"It's  really  all  I  can  do  to  understand  my- 
self," the  major  laughed.  "I  can  only  tell  you 
that  I  vowed  to  reform  the  moment  I  crossed 
my  aunt's  threshold.  I'm  bound  to  say  that, 
from  what  I  can  make  of  it,  she  does  not  seem 
anxious  that  I  should.  But  still,  that's  my  job 
— a  difficult  one,  but  I'm  doing  my  best." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  pointed  to  Miss  Delamare's 
slippers  that  were  on  the  fender. 

"You've  been  having  some  one  to  help  you," 
she  said  amiably.  But  the  major  had  noticed 
her  eye  on  them  by  the  speech  before  the  last. 


134  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Oh,  those?"  he  said;  "that's  a  little  present 
I  brought  for  poor  Olympia.  She's  so  liable  to 
cold  that  I  was  airing  them  a  little.  But  I  do 
wish  you'd  go." 

And  then  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  remarked:  "Poor 
fellow!" 

The  major  started  energetically  forward  in 
his  chair. 

"Look  here,"  he  shouted,  "don't  you  say 
that.  I  can  stand  anything  but  that.  There's 
nothing  the  matter  with  me.   I  don't  want  pity." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  looking  down  upon  the 
fender  with  what  she  meant  to  be  an  expression 
of  meditative  cruelty.  "Do  you  always  give 
people  second-hand  hearts — and  presents?"  she 
asked.    "These  slippers  have  been  worn,  I  see." 

"Why,  of  course,  Juliana,"  the  major  an- 
swered with  an  engaging  air  of  candor,  "I 
always  have  presents  worn  when  I  bring  them 
from  abroad.     It  saves  the  customs  duty." 

"I  see,"  she  said  slowly,  as  if  she  were  work-^ 
ing  out  a  riddle;  "you  get  Flossie  Delamare  to 
wear  them  before  you  present  them  to  your 
fiancee.  That's  what's  called  standing  in  an- 
other woman's  shoes,  isn't  it?  And  to  save  you 
the  trouble  of  lying  any  more — I  hid  in  a  door- 
way as  she  left  this  room;  I  had  enough  de- 
cency not  to  want  to  be  seen.  She  did  not 
seem  to  mind." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  135 

"Mind?"  the  major  asked.  "Why  should 
she  mind?  She's  got  a  good  conscience  and 
a  heart  of  gold." 

"Do  you  mean  to  say  that  I  haven't?"  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  asked. 

"I  don  t  see  how  you  can  have,"  the  major 
said,  still  with  his  candid  air — "coming  to  a 
man's  rooms  like  this,  and  trying  to  steal  him 
from  his  fiancee."  And  then — for  as  a  rule  his 
trouble  was  that  he  forgot  his  past  inventions 
— he  had  a  brilliant  stroke  of  memory,  and  he 
added:  "You  know,  my  dear  Juliana,  you  are 
astonishingly  off  the  track  here.  It  won't  wash. 
It  really  won't  wash.  When  I  said  in  the  train 
that  little  Flossie  was  a  sort  of  half-sister  of 
mine,  you  thought  I  was  lying.  But  I  wasn't. 
I  wasn't,  really.  It  was  only  what's  called  in- 
telligent anticipation.  You  see,  my  aunt  was 
in  this  room  a  short  time  ago,  saying  that  she 
meant  to  adopt  Flossie,  because  she  is  a  dear 
Httle  thing.  And  then  she  went  and  talked  to 
Flossie,  and  so,  of  course,  Flossie  was  naturally 
excited  about  it,  and  wanted  to  talk  to  me. 
And  if  you  don't  believe  that,  you'd  better  go 
and  ask  my  aunt  if  it  isn't  true.  That's  what 
you  ought  to  have  understood  when  I  said  a 
sort  of  half-sister.  It  is  only  the  president  of 
a  society  like  yours  that  could  put  an  evil  con- 
struction on  the  words." 


136  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Oh,  I  have  no  doubt,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said 
calmly,  "you  can  get  your  aunt  into  a  tale  with 
you.  You're  capable  of  anything  in  the  per- 
suasion line.  And  I  have  no  doubt  Miss  Dela- 
mare  can  look  after  herself." 

"But  what  about  your  reputation?"  the  major 
asked — "what  about  your  reputation  if  you 
should  be  discovered  here?" 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  laughed  sharply. 

"Oh,  I  knew  you'd  take  that  line,"  she  said; 
"but  look  here,  my  friend,  we  live  in  the  twen- 
tieth century,  not  the  eighteenth,  and  a  woman 
can  perfectly  be  alone  with  a  man  without 
losing  her  reputation." 

"Oh,  you  can  tell  that  to  my  aunt,"  the 
major  said. 

"So  I  have,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  asserted,  "and 
she  entirely  agrees  with  me  that  censoriousness 
is  the  worst  of  the  vices." 

"Oh,  well,"  the  major  said,  "you  just  tell  her 
to-morrow  morning  that  you  came  to  my  room 
at  a  quarter  past  twelve  at  night,  and  you'll  see 
the  fur  fly.  You  aren't  going  to  be  her  adopted 
daughter." 

"Oh,  you  aren't  going  to  get  out  of  it  in 
that  way,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said  calmly.  "I've 
come  here  as  one  man  might  to  another  to  ask 
you  what  you  mean  to  do." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  13Z 

"Well,  I'll  tell  you  what  I  jolly  well  mean  to 
do,'*  he  answered.  "I'm  engaged  to  Miss  Olym- 
pia  Peabody,  of  Boston,  Massachusetts,  and  I 
mean  to  be  as  faithful  to  her  as  I  can.  I  used 
to  think  that  it  would  be  as  easy  as  eating  eggs, 
to  be  a  reformed  character  under  the  virtuous 
roof  of  my  aunt  and  uncle.  But  it's  more  like 
the  temptation  of  Saint  Anthony.  I  couldn't 
have  imagined  that  British  middle-class  fami- 
lies could  be  this  sort  of  thing.  They  evidently 
are,  but  I  never  knew  anything  like  it." 

It  was  at  that  point  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
said  softly,  with  a  glance  on  the  ground: 

"Aren't  you  going  to  kiss  me,  Teddy?" 

And  the  major  remarked,  with  the  air  of  one 
bathed  in  monotony:  "No,  I'm  shot  if  I  am!" 

"Don't  you,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said,  "don't 
you  remember  Simla?" 

"Oh,  you  are  too  late  at  the  fair,"  the  major 
said.  "I  don't  remember  Simla.  I  don't  in  the 
least  want  to  remember  Simla.  The  last  time 
I  was  there  was  just  after  some  Abor  gentle- 
man had  shot  a  rotten  little  stone-headed  arrow 
into  my  thigh,  and  the  silly  little  stone  head 
came  off,  and  the  bone  sawyers  had  no  end  of 
a  job  in  getting  bits  of  it  out  for  months  after 
I  got  back  to  the  residency.  No,  I  don't  in 
the   least   want   to   remember   Simla." 


138  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"I  ought  to  have  been  there  to  nurse  you," 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said. 

"You  ought  to  have  been  nursing  your  huj 
band,"  the  major  said  grimly.     "I  had  an  R.  C* 
Sister." 

And  again  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  dropped  her 
voice : 

"Don't  you  want  to  marry  me,  Teddy?" 

"Well,"  the  major  said  levelly,  "speaking  as 
man  to  man,  I  don't.  I  want  to  marry  Olym- 
pia.  That  is  to  say,  I  don't  want  to,  I've  got 
to.  I'm  bound  in  honor,  and  that's  an  end 
of  it." 

"But  at  Simla  you  said  .  .  ."  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  was  beginning.  But  the  major  inter- 
rupted her  in  a  businesslike  voice: 

"I  never  said  a  single  word  about  marrying 
you  at  Simla.  I  remember  every  blessed  word 
I  did  say.  How  could  I  have  talked  about  mar- 
rying you?  You  had  a  husband,  and  you 
weren't  a  bit  more  in  earnest  than  I  was.  You 
were  just  flirting  with  a  subaltern  to  pass  the 
time,  and  to  get  conversation  to  put  in  your 
books.  Why,  you  were  ten  years  older  than  I 
was  then.  Of  course,  you're  younger  now. 
But  there  is  some  one  else  on  the  scene.  I  am 
very  sorry — you're  too  late.  You  said  I  was 
to  talk  to  you  as  a  man.  So  there,  you've  got 
it.     I  don't  want     .  .  ." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  139 

But  he  was  interrupted  in  his  turn  by  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe,  who  exclaimed: 

"Why!  where  did  that  horrible  little  dcg 
come  from?" 

And,  indeed,  a  very  small  Pekinese  spaniel, 
ike  a  piece  of  glossy  brown  hearth-rug,  was  sit- 
ing beside  the  major's  chair,  and  gazing  up  with 
adoration  at  one  of  his  hands  that  hung  over 
le  side.  The  major  sprang  up  sharply,  just  in 
ime  to  see  the  little  animal,  that  knew  his 
labits  very  well,  crawl  under  the  very  low  bed. 
He  sprang  after  it,  but  it  had  already  disap- 
peared, and  he  was  quite  unable  to  move  the 
bed  which,  with  its  great  carved  pillars  and 
heavy  walnut  canopy,  weighed  nearly  half  a 
ton. 

"Great  heavens !"  the  major  exclaimed,  "we're 
lost.  I'm  lost — you're  lost.  I  knew  it  would 
come.  Why  in  the  world  did  you  leave  the 
door  open?  If  I  could  have  caught  the  little 
beast,  I  might  have  chucked  him  outside,  and 
thrown  boots  and  things  at  him  till  he  went 
back  to  his  mistress.    As  it  is,  there's  no  hope." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  drew  herself  up  with  an 
expression  approaching  as  near  as  possible  to 
one  of  severe  virtue. 

"Do  you  suppose,"  she  said,  "that  I  was 
going  to  be  alone  with  a  man  at  night  with  a 
door  shut?'* 


140  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Well,  it's  usual  to  shut  the  door  on  these 
occasions,"  the  major  said. 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  remarked:  "I  don't  know 
what  sort  of  women  you  can  be  used  to." 

But  the  remark  failed  considerably  of  its  ef- 
fect, because  the  major  was  upon  his  stomach 
trying  to  get  under  the  bed,  which  was  much 
too  low  for  him.  He  leaned  upon  one  elbow 
and  glared  fiercely  at  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  laughed. 

"I  don't  see  what  it  matters,"  she  said.  But 
the  major  waved  at  her  the  arm  that  he  was 
not  leaning  on,  and  said  violently: 

"What  it  matters  is  that  I  shall  lose  Olympia. 
She'll  be  here  in  a  minute,  I'll  bet  my  head  she 
will.  There's  a  sort  of  psychic  afifinity  between 
her  and  that  Httle  beast  under  the  bed.  She 
says  she  wakes  up  in  the  night  and  feels  cold 
if  it  isn't  lying  on  her  door-mat.  I  tell  you,  I 
shall  lose  Olympia." 

"Well,  I  don't  care,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said. 

"And  if  you're  found  here,"  the  major  con- 
tinued, "they'll  say  you're  compromised,  and  I 
shall  have  to  marry  you." 

"Well,  I  don't  care,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  re- 
peated. 

"But  I  tell  you  this  too,  Juliana,"  the  major 
said  seriously,  "if  you're  compromised,  my  uncle 


[RING  FOR  NANCY  141 

certainly  won't  let  Flossie  Delamare  produce 
your  old  play.     That's  what  it  will  come  to." 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  suddenly  started  to  her  feet. 

"Not  produce  my  play!"  she  exclaimed. 
"But   that's   infamous!" 

"That's  what  will  happen,"  the  major  re- 
peated. "You  ought  to  have  thought  of  that 
before  you  came.  My  uncle  is  absolutely  de- 
voted to  Olympia." 

"I've  never  heard  of  such  a  thing,"  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  said.     "I'm  going  at  once." 

"That's  your  beastly  artistic  pride,"  the  major 
commented;  "you'd  rather  have  a  play  pro- 
duced than  even  a  husband  like  me.  But  you're 
not  going  down  that  staircase  when  there's  a 
twenty-to-one  chance  that  Olympia  is  coming 
up  it.    Listen!  Listen!"    He  held  up  one  finger. 

There  couldn't  be  any  doubt  that  some  one 
was  coming  up  the  stairs,  which  were  of  un- 
carpeted  and  polished  black  oak.  "Not  an- 
other word,"  the  major  whispered.  "I'll  do  my 
best;"  and  lying  upon  his  stomach  the  major 
began  to  emit,  in  a  series  of  melancholy  yelps, 
the  name  "George";  for  in  a  moment  of  jocular 
humor  the  major  had  christened  his  present  to 
Miss  Peabody  "George  Washington."  And  at 
the  necessary  point  he  called  out  sharply: 
"Who's   there?" 


142  RING  FOR  NANCY 

An  American  voice  with  a  highly  cultured 
English   accent   answered:   "It  is   I,    Olympia." 

"Oh,  well,"  the  major  said,  "the  father  of  his 
country  is  under  my  bed,  and  Tm  doing  my  best 
to  get  under  my  bed,  so  there,  in  a  manner  of 
speaking,  we  all  are." 

He  was  aware  that  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  behind 
the  great  bed  curtains,  was  pressing  as  close  to 
the  wall  as  she  reasonably  could. 

"I  woke  up,"  Miss  Peabody's  voice  said. 
"I  was  awakened  by  feeling  in  my  bones  that 
George  was  not  in  his  basket  on  the  mat  out- 
side my  door.  I  was  convinced  that  he  would 
be  here.     May  I  come  in?" 

The  major  was  getting  up  on  to  his  knees. 
"That  you  certainly  may  not!" 

"But  why  not?"  the  voice  came  from  the 
door.  "I  can  see  through  the  crack  that  you 
are  fully  dressed.     I'm  coming  in." 

The  major  stormed  as  fast  as  he  could 
toward  the  door,  but  Miss  Peabody  was  al- 
ready in  front  of  the  fireplace. 

"What  a  fine  room  you've  got,"  she  said; 
"it's  so  ancestral,  so  distinguished.  Don't  you 
think  we  could  induce  Lady  Savylle  to  sell  it  to 
us  for  our  home?" 

The  major  said — and  he  really  was  furiously 
angry: 


RING  FOR  NANCY  143 

"Now  this  really  won't  do.  You  must  get 
out  of  my  room  at  once.  It's  unheard  of  at 
this  time  of  night.  You've  never  done  anything 
like  this  before."  And  he  headed  her  off  from 
going  to  observe  the  panel.  The  room  was 
very  dark,  since  the  only  light  it  contained  was 
that  of  the  candle  that  Miss  Delamare  had  left. 

Olympia  said:  "It's  ridiculous  of  you,  Ted- 
dy! It's  not  as  if  I  was  some  flighty  young 
girl  or  one  of  your  dissolute  companions,  that 
I  hope  you've  given  up  for  good.  I  suppose 
I  can  be  trusted." 

"No,  you  can't,"  the  major  said.  "No  one 
can  be  trusted  at  this  time  of  night,  and  in  this 
latitude." 

"You  don't  seem  at  all  glad  to  see  me,"  Miss 
Peabody  said.     "Aren't  you  going  to  kiss  me?" 

The  major  said:  "Oh,  damn!"  And  then  he 
added:  "Look  here,  Olympia,  I'll  kiss  you  with 
pleasure  once  you're  outside  my  room.  You 
don't  understand.  You  can't  possibly  under- 
stand. This  isn't  Boston.  I  can't  have  things 
said  against  my  wife.  Any  one  may  be  coming 
in." 

"You  don't  seem  quite  master  of  yourself 
to-night,"  Olympia  said.  "I  hope  you  haven't 
been  taking  that  nasty  champagne  again.  Who 
would  be  likely  to  come  in  at  this  hour?" 


144  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Anybody  might,"  the  major  answered.  "It's 
the  custom  of  the  comitry.  Besides,  it's  the 
principle  of  the  thing  that  I  object  to.  It  isn't 
right.     It  isn't  proper." 

And  suddenly  his  face  really  paled  beneath 
its  tan,  and  his  attitude  of  appalled  listening 
was  so  intense  that  even  Miss  Olympia  was 
silent.  From  far  away  he  had  heard  a  voice 
wailing: 

"Teddy!  I  say,  Teddy!  I  can't  find  my 
room."  It  was  only  the  trained  voice  of  an 
actress  that  could  have  carried  so  far,  and  have 
made  the  words  so  distinct. 

"What's  that?"  Olympia  exclaimed. 

*T  don't  know,"  the  major  said  desperately. 
"It's  an  echo!  It's  a  ghost.  You  never  know 
what  goes  on  in  these  old  houses." 

And  first  he  thought  of  pushing  Miss  Pea- 
body  out  of  the  room  and  then  he  thought  of 
running  to  the  door  to  keep  the  other  woman 
out;  but  if  he  did  that,  he  was  perfectly  certain 
that  Olympia  would  go  to  examine  the  panel, 
and  see  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  who  was  hiding  be- 
hind the  curtain.  If  it  had  only  been  the  purple 
kimono  she  would  have  been  invisible  in  the 
shadows,  but  the  golden  embroidered  swallows 
upon  the  lady's  breast  he  had  observed  already 
to    gleam    like    brass    plates.      And    then    Miss 


RING  FOR  NANCY 


145 


Delamare,  who  had  evidently  been  coming  very 
fast,  ran  into  the  room  and  exclaimed  breath- 
lessly: 

*'I  say,  Teddy,  I  can't  find  my  room.  I've 
been  walking  for  miles  and  I  can't  find  it.  I 
shall  have  to  stop  here  all  .  .  ." 

And  she  stopped  suddenly  with  the  exclama- 
tion: "Oh,  I  didn't  know  you'd  got  company; 
I'm  sure  I  beg  your  pardon." 


VII 

T?OR  a  moment  the  major  was  certain  that 
•*•  an  icy  chill  passed  between  the  two  ladies. 
He  could  feel  it  in  his  bones.  And  then  he 
remarked  seriously  to  Olympia: 

"Now  you  have  gone  and  ruined  my  repu- 
tation !" 

Miss  Peabody  had  become  the  fiery  red  of 
pure  rage.     She  remarked  simply: 

"Nonsense!    You're  a  man!" 

"But  haven't  you,"  the  major  said,  "haven't 
you  rubbed  it  into  me  enough  that  a  man  has 
to  be  just  as  careful  about  these  things  as  a 
woman?  Aren't  you  always  saying  that  a  man 
ought  to  be  as  spotless  as  a  nun?  Isn't  that 
why  you're  president  of  the  Boston  Society  for 
Reforming  Young  Men?  And  now,  Olympia, 
you  have  ruined  my  reputation  forever." 

But  Miss  Peabody,  who  was  growing  redder 
and  redder,  positively  hissed  between  her  teeth: 
"This  appears  to  me  to  be  nonsense!"  And 
she  snapped  at  Miss  Delamare  the  words: 
"What  are  you  doing  here?" 

Miss  Delamare  answered  in  a  quite  deter- 
146 


RING  FOR  NANCY  147 

mined  tone:  ''Well,  for  the  matter  of  that, 
what  are  yoii  doing  here?" 

There  seemed  to  the  major  nothing  to  remain 
but  to  treat  the  whole  thing  in  a  spirit  of  sheer 
farce.  As  far  as  he  could  see,  his  hands  were 
perfectly  clean,  but  he  simply  wouldn't  face  the 
least  chance  of  proving  it — and  for  the  matter 
of  that,  all  these  women's  reputations  would  be 
damaged,  and  there  would  be  a  regular  beastly 
scandal,  if  he  didn't  do  his  level  best  to  carry 
the  whole  thing  off  with  a  hand  light  enough 
for  the  whipping  of  silHbubs.  And  he  just 
said: 

''In  the  name  of  heaven,  what  are  we  all 
doing  here?" 

And  Olympia,  dropping  for  a  moment  the 
cold  purity  of  her  training,  remarked  harshly: 
"Now  that's  enough  of  this.  I  want  an  ex- 
planation." 

"That's  just,"  the  major  said,  "that's  just 
exactly  what  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  wanted.  I'm  no 
good  at  explanations.  You'd  better  ask  Flos- 
sie." 

Miss  Peabody  remarked,  as  was  to  be  ex- 
pected of  her:  "Flossie,  indeed!"  And  then 
she  fixed  Miss  Delamare  with  a  baleful  glare. 
"Well,  I'm  waiting." 

"So    am    I,"    Miss    Delamare    said.      "And    if 


148  RING  FOR  NANCY 

you  want  to  know  what  I'm  waiting  for,  it's 
this:  I've  been  brought  down  to  this  place  in 
the  interests  of  the  pure  drama.  It  doesn't 
seem  to  me  that  I  ought  to  be  exposed  to  the 
chances  of  finding  unmarried  American  ladies 
in  gentlemen's  bedrooms." 

"Edward!"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed  tragic- 
ally, "are  you  going  to  see  me  exposed  to  these 
insults?" 

"But,  my  poor  dear  Olympia,"  the  major 
said,  "she  is  only  expressing  what  I  told  you  I 
felt  myself.  Oh,  hang  it  all,  I  can't  explain. 
Then  the  only  thing  left  seems  to  be  for  Juliana 
to  do  it."  And  he  called  out:  "Hi!  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe,  come  out  from  behind  that  curtain." 

For  it  had  suddenly  occurred  to  him  that 
there  were  ten  chances  to  one  that  the  lady 
would  be  discovered,  and  there  was  nothing 
in  the  world  to  prevent  her  being  used,  even 
at  that  late  date,  as  chaperon.  She  must,  by 
all  reasonable  chances,  be  under  his  thumb. 
And  when  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  with  a  face  pale 
with  rage,  came  around  the  foot  of  the  bed, 
he  said  to  Miss  Delamare,  whom  he  could 
trust  to  leg  him  up: 

"Oh,  I  say,  put  a  screen  in  front  of  the  fire- 
place. There  will  be  another  woman  coming 
down  the  chimney,  and  it  might  not  look  de- 
corous." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  149 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  exclaimed  sharply: 

"Major  Foster,  I  insist  upon  an  explanation 
of  this  insult,"  almost  at  the  same  moment  as 
Miss  Peabody  asked: 

"Who  is  this  person?" 

The  major  said,  with  all  the  air  of  a  calm 
introducer: 

"Let  me  introduce  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  to  you. 
yirs.  Kerr  Howe,  the  authoress  of  the  future 
pure  drama — I  brought  her  down  by  the  last 
train  with  me." 

"So  it  appears,"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed; 
and  then  she  added:  "I  know  all  about  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe." 

And  at  almost  the  same  moment  Miss  Dela- 
mare  said  in  a  quite  audible  voice:  "Good  old 
Teddy!" 

Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  and  Olympia  were  maintain- 
ing an  ominous  silence.  And  then  the  major 
got  his  idea.  He  had  been  thinking  of  once 
more  claiming  Flossie  as  his  half-sister,  because 
his  aunt  might  be  trusted  to  leg  him  out.  Just 
then  what  he  thought  was  inspiration  came  to 
him,  and  he  exclaimed: 

"That's  right — that's  how  I  like  to  see  you — - 
nice  and  friendly.  We  shall  all  be  kissing  and 
making  friends  in  a  minute  or  two." 

"That  we  certainly  shan't,"  Miss  Peabody 
said. 


h 


150  RING  FOR  NANCY 

He  took  no  notice  of  her,  but  drew  his  breath 
for  a  long  speech.  "Oh,  yes,  we  shall,"  he  be- 
gan, "as  soon  as  I've  given  my  explanation. 
I've  got  it!  It's  as  clear  as  mud.  See  here, 
Juliana — ^you  came  down  with  me  in  the  last 
train,  didn't  you?  And  you,  Flossie,  you  were 
dying  to  tell  me  all  about  your  new  theater. 
And  so  you,  Juliana,  very  kindly  offered  to 
chaperon  Flossie,  and  to  help  explain  about 
the  new  pure  theater.  So  there  we  were,  all 
three  comfortably  sitting  over  the  fire,  when 
Flossie  remembered  that  she'd  forgotten  to 
bring  the  plans  of  the  new  theater,  so,  of  course, 
Flossie  went  to  get  the  plans,  so  Juliana  was 
left  alone  with  me.  I  don't  see  anything  wrong 
about  that.     Olympia,  do  you?" 

"But  why,"  Miss  Peabody  asked  suspiciously, 
"did  Miss  Delamare  leave  her  shoes?" 

It  was  then  that  the  major  made  what  was 
very  nearly  a  fatal  mistake.  For,  as  it  oc- 
curred to  him  afterward,  nothing  would  have 
been  easier  than  to  say  that  Flossie  just  didn't 
want  to  make  a  noise;  instead  of  which  he  said: 
"Oh,  the  shoes!  Well,  you  see,  they  were  a 
little  present  I  was  going  to  bring  you  from 
Paris.  And  Flossie  was  wearing  them  so  as 
to  air  them,  and  to  prevent  my  having  to  pay 
customs  duty.    So,  of  course,  when  Flossie  went 


RING  FOR  NANCY  151 

away  she  left  the  shoes  on  my  grate.  Because, 
you  know,  theyVe  really  your  shoes.  She 
couldn't  take  them.  And  really,  it's  you  who 
ought  to  explain  how  your  shoes  come  to  be 
found  by  my  grate." 

Olympia  again  became  very  red. 

"I  don't  understand  what  all  this  rigmarole 
is  about,"  she  said. 

*'Oh,  go  away  and  think  it  over,"  the  major 
exclaimed  quite  cheerfully.  "It  explains  every- 
thing." 

"But  it  doesn't,"  Olympia  exclaimed.  "If 
the  shoes  are  already  in  this  country,  why 
should  you  have  to  pay  customs  duty  on  them?" 

"Oh,"  the  major  answered,  "I  was  going  to 
give  them  to  you  in  Paris :  it  would  have  been 
French    customs    duty." 

"But  I'm  not  going  to  Paris,"  Miss  Peabody 
said. 

"Well,  you  see,"  the  major  answered,  "I'm  a 
man  who  likes  to  be  prepared  for  everything. 
I  thought  that  one  day  you  might  be  going  to 
Paris,  and  so  it  would  be  nice  to  have  them 
already  to  give  you.  You  ought  to  regard  it  as 
a  touching  attention  on  my  part,  instead  of 
kicking  up  such  a  terrible  row.  And  all  about 
a  pair  of  shoes.  Oh,  Olympia,  I'm  ashamed  of 
you!" 


152  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Miss  Peabody  exclaimed  ominously:  "Major 
Brent  Foster  .  .  ." 

And  the  major,  though  he  didn't  at  the  mo- 
ment know  why,  felt  a  sudden  gush  of  joy; 
nevertheless  he  said:  "Major  Brent  Foster! 
Why  don't  you  call  me  Edward — or  even 
Teddy?" 

"Because,"  Olympia  exclaimed,  "I  believe 
that  all  is  over  between  us." 

Miss  Delamare  exclaimed  just  under  her 
breath:     "Poor  fellow!" 

For  a  moment  the  major  felt  a  strong  in- 
clination to  leave  it  at  that.  And  he  would 
have  left  it  if  there  hadn't  come  into  his  rather 
chivalrous  soul  the  disagreeable  idea  of  all  these 
women's  reputations.  There  would  be  Miss  Pea- 
body  going  envenomedly  about  the  world  mis- 
calling, in  a  quite  skilful  manner,  not  only  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe,  but  Flossie,  who  certainly  hadn't 
deserved  it.  And  there  would  certainly  be  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  going  about  casting  doubts  on  the 
virtue  of  poor  Olympia,  who  equally  didn't  de- 
serve it.     So  he  exclaimed: 

"Oh,  do  let  us  have  a  little  common  sense! 
Haven't  I  explained  everything?" 

"No,  you  explained  nothing  at  all,"  Miss 
Peabody  said.  "In  the  first  place,  Miss  Dela- 
mare was  just  as  much  astonished  as  I  was  to 
see  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  here  at  all." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  153 

"Of  course,  she  would  be,"  the  major  said. 
*'She  had  been  gone  from  the  room  a  long  time. 
She  naturally  expected  to  find  that  Juliana 
would  be  gone  when  she  came  back.  It 
wouldn't  have  been  proper  for  Juliana  to  be 
here  alone  without  Flossie  on  hand  to  chaperon 
her." 

"But  why,"  Olympia  asked,  "did  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  hide  behind  the  bed  curtain  if  she  hadn't 
a  guilty  conscience?" 

"Why,  that,"  the  major  said,  "that's  because 
she  has  such  a  kind  heart.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
has  the  kindest  heart  of  any  woman  that  I 
know.  She  hid  behind  the  curtain  in  order  to 
spare  your  blushes,  Olympia.  She  thought  you 
would  have  been  embarrassed  if  you  knew  you 
were  discovered  coming  to  my  room  like  this. 
Because,  of  course,  it  makes  it  so  much  worse 
your  being  engaged  to  me.  So  she  hid  behind 
the  curtain  so  that  you  shouldn't  know  she 
knew.     That  explains  that." 

He  didn't  in  the  least  know  how  it  happened, 
but  suddenly  he  was  aware  of  the  voice  of  her 
ladyship's  own  maid,  and  that  the  white  cap 
and  strings  and  the  white  apron  of  Miss  Jenkins 
were  in  the  room.  She  was  standing  at  the 
foot  of  the  bed  with  her  hands  clasped  before 
her,  and  her'  mysterious  confidentially  confident 
air  of  the  really  good  servant  who,  being  above 


154  RING  FOR  NANCY 

all  the  vicissitudes  and  tragedies  of  this  earth, 
can  put  everything  right  by  a  suggestion  or  tv^o. 
And  she  was  remarking  in  the  most  perfectly 
level  tones: 

"Wouldn't  it  be  much  better,  sir,  just  to  tell 
the  truth?  I'm  sure  there's  nothing  in  the  least 
wrong  about  the  truth,  sir." 

The  major  suddenly  fell  down  again  into  his 
armchair. 

"My  God,  Flossie!"  he  exclaimed;  "you  can 
take  the  screen  away  from  the  front  of  the  fire 
again.  She's  come  by  the  secret  door  instead 
of  the  chimney!" 

The  high  voice  of  Miss  Peabody  sounded  in 
the  room. 

"Perhaps  you  will  kindly  explain  your  pres- 
ence." 

Miss  Jenkins  stood  with  her  hands  still  down 
as  if  she  were  smoothing  out  her  apron. 

"Well,  miss,"  she  said,  "I  am  in  charge  of 
this  house  in  the  interests  of  her  ladyship, 
Mary,  Countess  Savylle." 

"But  that  doesn't  explain  why  you're  here," 
Miss  Peabody  repeated. 

"Well,  miss,  you  see,  miss,"  Miss  Jenkins 
continued  calmly,  "I  heard  a  great  noise  of 
quarreling,  if  you'll  excuse  me,  miss,  and  so  I 
came  to  see  if  you  mightn't  be  breaking  the 
furniture  over  one  another,  if  you'll  excuse  my 


RING  FOR  NANCY  155 

being  so  free,  miss,  since  it's  my  duty  to  look 
after  the  furniture.  There  are  some  very  valu- 
able things  here  in  this  room.  Now  this  panel, 
for  instance,  I'm  sure  her  ladyship  would  he 
heart-broken  if  anything  happened  to  this  panel. 
For  the  painting,  it's  by  Van  Dyke,  and  if  one 
of  you  was  to  throw  the  other  against  it,  it 
might  be  very  bad  for  its  works.  It  works  like 
this,  miss,  don't  you  see,  miss.'^"  And  Miss 
Jenkins  moved  calmly  toward  the  frame  of  the 
panel.  The  knob  moved  so  easily  that  she  ap- 
peared, in  the  gloom,  merely  to  wave  her  hand 
and  the  panel  no  more  to  exist.  Instead  there 
was  the  brilliant  light  of  Miss  Delamare's  room 
shining  in  upon  them  all. 

The  major  exclaimed:  "Well,  now,  that  ex- 
plains everything/' 

But  Miss  Peabody  merely  answered: 

*T  am  not  a  bit  satisfied  and  nothing  is  ex- 
plained." 

"But  don't  you  see,"  the  major  asked,  "that's 
Flossie's  room — that's  how  she  came  to  be 
here." 

Miss  Peabody  said  icily:  "I  quite  under- 
stand that.  Major  Foster.  It  only  makes  it  all 
the  worse.'* 

Once  more  Miss  Jenkins  interposed:  "If  I 
might  make  so  bold,  miss,  as  to  ask  you  to 
listen   to  me,   miss." 


156  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"That  you  certainly  may  not,"  Miss  Peabody 
said.  "Fm  not  used  to  being  talked  to  by 
servants." 

"Of  course,  that's  your  American  way,  miss," 
Miss  Jenkins  said,  with  a  calmness  of  extreme 
insolence,  "you  are  so  democratic.  But  this  is 
England,  miss,  and  you  see  Fm  a  sort  of  foster- 
sister  to  the  countess.  And  she  treating  me 
just  as  if  I  were  her  equal,  it  makes  me  a  little 
free  in  my  speech  with  such  old  friends  of  the 
countess  as  Major  Foster  is.  So  I  hope  you'll 
pardon  me,  miss,  if  I  ask  you  to  think  the  best 
you  can  of  Major  Foster,  for  I'll  give  you  my 
word  of  honor,  if  you'll  take  a  servant's  word, 
being  so  American-like,  and  remembering  that 
you're  in  England,  that  the  major  is  perfectly 
innocent,  thought  apt  to  be  a  little  frivolous  in 
such  things  as  explanations,  miss." 

There  seemed  to  have  arisen  between  these 
two  women,  from  the  very  sight  of  each  other, 
one  of  those  bitter  hatreds  of  which  only  women 
are  capable.  And  it  was  with  a  rudeness  really 
extraordinary  that  Miss  Peabody  answered: 

"No,  I'll  certainly  not  take  your  word.  No 
servant  ever  spoke  the  truth." 

"That's  because  you're  used  to  American 
servants,  miss,  if  I  may  make  so  bold,"  Miss 
Jenkins   answered.      "We   only   export    inferior 


RING  FOR  NANCY  157 

ones  to  the  United  States.  Her  ladyship  and 
such-like  keep  the  best  at  home." 

"It's  no  good  talking."  Miss  Peabody  at- 
temped  to  close  the  discussion.  "I'm  not  the 
one  to  act  precipitately.  But  I  shall  certainly 
act." 

"That  was  what  I  wanted  to  suggest,  your 
Ladyship — I  beg  pardon — miss,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said;  "but  being  so  much  with  her  ladyship  it 
seems  to  come  natural-like.  What  I  wanted  to 
suggest  was  that  you  shouldn't  come  to  any 
determination  for  a  day  or  two,  and  then  you 
can  keep  an  eye  upon  the  major  and  these 
ladies,  and  see  how  they  behave." 

At  this  point  Miss  Delamare  exclaimed  again : 
"Poor  old  Teddy!" 

"That's  precisely  what  I  intend  to  do,"  Miss 
Peabody  said.  "But  don't  you  imagine  that  it 
is  at  your  suggestion.  I  shall  keep  an  eye  on 
these  people.  And  if  I  observe  anything  in  the 
least  suspicious,  I  shall  break  off  my  engage- 
ment with  Major  Foster  at  once " 

"What!"  the  major  exclaimed.  "Isn't  it 
broken  off  already?" 

"I  shall  break  off  my  engagement  at  once," 
Miss  Peabody  continued,  "and  then  I  shall  go 
to  Mr.  Foster  and  tell  him  why;  and  that  will 
be  an  end  of  your  theater.  Miss  Delamare,  and 


158  RING  FOR  NANCY 

your  play,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  and  Major  Foster 
will  be  cut  out  of  his  uncle's  will." 

"And  very  proper  too,  miss,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said. 

"I  didn't  ask  you  to  make  a  remark,"  Miss 
Peabody  exclaimed;  and  then  she  said  clearly 
and  distinctly:  "Edward,  you  may  kiss  me — to 
show  these  ladies " 

The  major  started  violently.  "Oh!"  he  said, 
and  he  pointed  to  the  door  behind  Miss  Pea- 
body's  back.  "Oh!  the  dog!  George  Washing- 
ton's just  run  out  of  the  door." 

Miss  Peabody  wavered  for  a  moment,  and 
then  she  turned  toward  the  door.  She  dis- 
appeared, and  they  could  hear  her  calling  in 
the  corridor:     "Georgie!    Georgie!" 

The  major  pulled  out  his  handkerchief  and 
wiped  his  forehead. 

"Thank  heaven,  that  taught  me  that  lie," 
he  said. 

''Didn't  the  dog  go  out  of  the  door?"  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  asked. 

"Not  a  bit,"  the  major  answered  cheerfully. 
"The  little  beast  is  under  my  bed.  But  if  that 
lie  hadn't  come  into  my  head  I  should  have  had 
to  kiss  Olympia — and  think  how  painful  that 
would  have  been  for  all  of  you!" 

At  that  point  Miss  Jenkins  remarked  in  Her 
cool  and  businesslike   tones: 


RING  FOR  NANCY  159 

"I  think,  if  you'll  excuse  me,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
and  Miss  Delamare,  you  had  better  just  go 
through  that  panel  into  Miss  Delamare's  room, 
and  then  I'll  close  it.  If  the  dog  is  still  here, 
it's  likely  Miss  Olympia  will  be  coming  back, 
and  you'd  better  not  be  seen  here  again." 

'*0h,  yes,"  the  major  exclaimed  energetically. 
"Good  gracious!  Go!  Go!"  And  he  positively 
pushed  them  through  the  opening.  Miss  Dela- 
mare smiled  at  him  maliciously  over  her  shoul- 
der. 

"Aren't  you  going  to  kiss  us  good  night, 
Teddy?"  she  asked. 

But  Miss  Jenkins  fatefully  extended  her  hand 
to  the  frame  and  the  portraits  of  her  lady- 
ship's ancestors  marched  right  across  Miss 
Delamare's  face. 


VIII 

QHE  stood  looking  at  him,  vaguely  lighted 
^  from  beside  the  panel,  and  for  the  last  time, 
he  sank  down  into  his  chair. 

*'My  girl,''  he  said,  "you've  saved  my  bacon." 

She  answered,  with  her  calm  and  superior 
intonation:  "I  would  not  be  so  certain  of  that, 
sir." 

"Oh,  111  be  as  careful  as  the  grave,"  he  said 
confidently.  "A  night  like  this  would  have  been 
enough  to  make  Solomon  himself  a  reformed 
character." 

In  some  way  he  read  on  her  expressionless 
face  an  expression  of  dubiety. 

"I  don't  know,  sir,"  she  said.  "Of  course, 
you  may  have  done  the  right  thing,  treating 
the  whole  thing  as  a  farce.  I  recognized  what 
you  were  doing,  sir,  but  a  time  seemed  to  come 
when  it  appeared  better  to  tell  the  truth.  That 
was  why  I  came  in.  I  hope  you  will  excuse 
it,  sir." 

He  gave  her  a  keen  glance. 

"Fow  were  listening  all  the  time,"  he  said. 

"I  certainly  was,  sir,"  she  answered  coolly. 
160 


RING  FOR  NANCY  161 

"It  seemed  to  be  my  duty,  sir.  I'm  not  in 
the  least  ashamed,  sir." 

The  major  said:  "It's  the  sort  of  thing  that 
most  servants  would  be  ashamed  of  being 
caught  at." 

"But  you  see,  sir,"  she  answered,  "  I  wasn't 
caught.  I  just  stepped  in  when  it  appeared  to 
be  useful.  I  knew  something  of  the  sort  would 
happen.  Something  of  the  sort  always  does 
happen.  And  I  wanted  to  be  able  to  report  to 
her  ladyship  .  .  ." 

The  major  ejaculated:  "By  God!  you're  go- 
ing to  report  the  whole  thing  to  Mary  Savylle?" 

"Every  word,  sir,"  Miss  Jenkins  answered 
calmly.     "That  is  my  duty." 

Again  the  major  said:     "Great  heavens!" 

"I  don't  see,"  Miss  Jenkins  said  argumenta- 
tively,  and  with  her  eyes  on  the  ground,  "if  you 
come  to  think  of  it,  that  you  have  done  any- 
thing that  would  displease  her  ladyship. 
You've  tried  to  be  faithful  to  Miss  Olympia  as 
was  your  duty,  though  a  difficult  one.  And 
you've  said  nothing  about  her  ladyship  that 
would  not  have  made  her  a  pleased  and  proud 
woman  if  she  heard  it.  And  you  behaved  very 
— very  straightforwardly  with  the  other  ladies." 
Miss  Jenkins'  voice  became  rather  low,  and  as 
if  she   were   whispering  reflectively,    she    said: 


162  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"No,  I  can  not  see  that  anything  will  displease 
her  ladyship.'* 

The  major  brightened  suddenly.  "Why,  I 
believe  you're  right,"  he  said.  "I  have  been 
behaving  rather  creditably.  Who  would  have 
thought  that?"  He  remained  thinking,  and  she 
remained  looking  down  at  him.  And  suddenly 
he  began  to  feel  emotions,  quivers  and  thrills 
of  emotions.  He  leaned  forward  in  his  chair 
and  said:     "I  say,  what's  your  name?" 

She   answered   dutifully:     "Yes,   sir?" 

And  he  exclaimed:  "Won't  you  let  me  kiss 
you?" 

It  appeared  to  him  at  the  moment  the  most 
desirable,  the  most  important  thing  in  the 
world.  She  did  not  appear  to  be  a  servant; 
she  did  not  appear  even  to  be  a  woman — but 
she  seemed  to  be  a  warmth,  a  force,  a  light,  a 
magnet  that  was  drawing  him  toward  her. 
And  it  was  like  being  awakened  very  early  and 
roughly  when  with  a  dry  voice  she  said: 

"Certainly  not,  sir." 

He  said  dully:  "No,  I  suppose  not.  But  it's 
as  true  as  death  that  I'm  desperately  in  love 
with  you." 

"I  dare  say,  sir,"  she  answered  in  a  matter-of- 
fact  tone.    "But  there's  Miss  Olympia." 

He  passed  his  hand  down  his  forehead.  He 
was  vastly  disturbed. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  163 

''Of  course,  there^s  poor  Olympia,"  he  said. 

"You  wouldn't  throw  Miss  Olympia  over?" 
]\Iiss  Jenkins  asked.  "Not  even  for  her  lady- 
ship?" 

"No,"  he  answered.  "No,  I  certainly  couldn't. 
When,  just  now,  she  talked  as  if  she  were  going 
to  have  done  with  me — why,  my  heart  jumped 
in  my  side  .  .  ." 

"So  that  if  Miss  Peabody  could  be  got  to 
throw  you  .  .  ." 

The  major,  who  had  been  inspecting  his 
boots,  looked  up  at  her. 

"Now,"  he  said,  "we  can't  decently  talk  that 
over.  It  isn't  proper.  I  don't  want  to  seem  to 
reprove  you,  but  the  lady  is  my  affianced  wife, 
and  she  has  done  nothing  at  all  to  deserve  being 
talked  over." 

"Not  even  just  now?"  the  girl  asked,  with  a 
touch  of  hardness.  "When  she  was  so  out- 
rageously rude  .  .  ." 

The  major  shook  his  head. 

"No,"  he  answered  decisively.  "It  was  per- 
fectly natural.  It  was  perfectly  legitimate. 
Circumstances  looked  very  suspicious;  there's 
no  denying  it.  She  could  not  be  asked  to  be- 
have as  if  she  were  at  a  tea-party.  She's  a  good 
lady;  she  has  been  as  kind  to  me  as  she  knows 
how.  I  can't  have  her  talked  over  if  you  at- 
tracted me  a  million  times  as  much." 


164  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"I'm  talking  for  her  ladyship,"  the  girl  said. 
"I'm  pleading  for  her  ladyship,  if  you  like. 
I'm  not  ashamed.  You  had  a  moral  duty  to  her, 
ladyship.  When  you  went  away  you  nevert 
swore  to  be  faithful  to  her.  But  wasn't  it  im- 
plied? Wasn't  it  implied  enough  to  keep  her' 
faithful  to  you  for  years  and  years?  Wasn't 
it?     Wasn't  it?" 

The  major  hung  his  head  down.  j 

"That  sort  of  thing  is  rather  all  nonsense,"  he  I 
said.     "It  isn't  three  hundred  years  ago." 

"Oh,  yes,  it  is,"  she  answered;  "in  that  it's 
three  hundred  years.  Nothing  has  changed' 
since  Jacob  served  for  Rachel.  You  gave  hen: 
ladyship  certain  rights.  You  gave  her  the; 
right  to  expect  that  you  would  ask  her  again. 
You  never  did.  Then  what's  to  prevent  her; 
ladyship  saying  things  against  Miss  Peabody?: 
What's  to  prevent  it?  There  are  things  to  say 
against  her.  She's  taken  away  another  wom-i 
an's  man." 

"She  didn't  know  it,"  the  major  said  list-i 
lessly. 

"Didn't  know  it!"  the  girl  said  with  a  fierce 
contempt.  "Of  course,  she  knows  it.  Of 
course,  she  knows  that  she  is  a  criminal." 

"Now  drop  that,"  the  major  said  harshly. 

"A   criminal,"    the   girl   continued.      "Isn't   it 


RING  FOR  NANCY  165 

criminal  for  a  woman  of  her  type  to  take  a  man 
of  yours?  Doesn't  she  know  that  if  she  were 
worthy  of  the  name  of  a  woman  she  ought  to 
put  you  back  again?  In  her  heart  she  knows 
it.  In  her  heart  she  felt  bad.  "When  she  was 
talking  to  me  or  to  little  Miss  Delamare  she 
was  odious  and  rude  and  hateful.  Why?  Be- 
cause she  felt  wicked,  evil,  criminal.  .  .  .  She 
saw  you  standing  beside  me  or  her — and  she 
knew  that  it  was  one  Hke  us  that  ought  to  be 
your  proper  mate  .  .  ." 

"Now  drop  that,"  the  major  exclaimed  harsh- 
ly. "Do  you  understand?  That  is  not  talk  for 
the  servants'  hall.  IVe  got  to  behave  honor- 
ably." 

"What  do  you  know  of  the  servants'  hall?" 
she  said  bitterly.  "What  do  you  know  of 
honor,  for  the  matter  of  that?" 

"I've  got  my  rules,"  the  major  said.  "Now 
you  go!" 

"Rules!"  she  repeated  harshly.  "Yes,  rules 
that  will  let  a  woman  sicken  and  pine  and  long 
and  linger  as — as  her  ladyship  has  done.  And 
wake  up  in  the  night,  and  in  the  morning  there 
would  be  her  pillow  wet  for  the  servants  to  find 
and  know  the  shameful  truth  that  she  was  cry- 
ing for  a  man  that  cared  more  for  his  rules  than 
all  her  tears!     That's  the  thing  that  shames  a 


166  RING  FOR  NANCY 

woman!  And  you  never  came,  and  you  never 
w^rote,  and  you  never  thought  .  .  ." 

"Damnation!"  the  major  really  screamed. 
"Was  it  me  that  should  go  running  to  a  woman 
I  couldn't  support?  Was  it  me  that  should  go 
running  to  a  woman  with  castles  and  jewels 
and  titles  to  her  name?" 

"Yes,  damn  your  Irish  honor!"  she  cried  out; 
"and  damn  your  black,  novel-reading,  Papist 
pride!  It  was  your  duty  to  come  crawling  to 
the  woman  you  adored;  it  was  your  duty  to 
give  her  the  pride  and  joy  of  tending  you,  and 
you,  you  give  it  to  another  woman!  You  give 
it  to  the  wicked  stranger  and  she  gets  all  the 
pride  and  joy  of  tending  you  who  have  tried 
like  a  hero,  and  ruined  your  poor  eyes  like  a 
scholar  and  ruined  your  life  and  the  life  of  the 
woman  you  adored,  God  help  you  both,  like  the 
black  evil  fool  that  you  are." 

The  major  looked  at  her,  leaning  forward  in 
wide-eyed  astonishment. 

"Now  by  the  seven  wonders  of  the  world. 
.  .  ."  he  shouted  at  last.  And  then  he  fell  back 
against  the  cushions  of  his  chair  and  began  to 
laugh  feebly  like  a  child.  "And  isn't  this  the 
grand  comedy!"  he  said  while  his  sides  still 
shook.  "Here's  you  and  here's  me,  and  the  two 
of   us   working   ourselves    into    epileptical    pas- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  167 

sions,  when  in  the  hearts  of  us  we're  both  of  us 
agreeing  the  one  with  the  other,  and  for  all  I 
know  admiring  the  other  more  than  is  good  for 

us — at    least    it's    true    of    me — and — and '* 

He  stood  up  suddenly  and  stretched  out  his 
hand.  "And  it's  taking  my  hand  you  will  be 
doing!"  he  exclaimed;  "for  I'm  no  more  than  a 
poor  Irish  fool,  that  will  be  always  in  the  wars 
life  the  father  before  me,  and  his  fathers  forever 
and  ever!  And  where  it  will  all  end,  God  in 
His  mercy  knows!  But  I'm  sick  enough  and 
sore  enough  to  make  it  good  and  soothing  to 
me  to  touch  the  hand  of  a  good  woman  that's 
your  own  self!" 

She  put  her  own  hand  swiftly  behind  her 
back. 

"You're  agreeing  with  me,"  she  said,  "but  not 
I  with  you.  I  don't  agree  that  honor  demanded 
what  you've  done,  which  is  what  you  have  been 
trying  to  trepan  me  into  saying.  I  don't  agree, 
and  I  will  never  take  you  by  the  hand,  Major 
Brent  Foster,  and  you  have  no  right  to  ask  it  of 
a  poor  servant — until  your  hand  is  laid  in  her 
ladyship's  in  the  pledge  of  marriage.  And 
that  I  will  work  for,  and  that,  by  the  grace  of 
God,  I  will  bring  about." 

The  major,  whose  moods  altered  like  the  sky 
in  April,  looked  at  her  with  laughing  eyes. 


168  RING  FOR  NANCY 

*'Well,  the  blessing  of  God  go  with  you,"  he 
said.  "But  keep  this  in  your  obstinate,  pretty, 
lovely  head,  that  never  will  I  ask  her  ladyship 
that  question  until  Miss  Olympia  gives  me  up 
as  freely  and  as  frankly  as  you  refused  me  the 
kiss  I  asked  of  you." 

"She  shall  do  it  with  ten  times  the  loathing 
that  I  did,"  Miss  Jenkins  exclaimed,  "if  I  have 
to  burn  down  this  old  place  to  bring  it  about." 

The  major  suddenly  stretched  himself. 

"It's  time  we  were  remembering  our  places," 
he  said.  "My  girl,  this  is  more  like  the  bogs  of 
Galway  than  the  eastern  end  of  God-fearing 
Hampshire.  WeVe  forgotten  ourselves,  and 
that  is  the  truth  of  it." 

Miss  Jenkins  drew  herself  up  and  smoothed 
her  apron. 

"You  wanted  some  hot  water,  sir,"  she  said. 
"I'll  put  it  outside  your  door  and  knock,  for  you 
will  be  wanting  to  get  to  bed." 

"Oh,  don't  spoil  me,"  the  major  said. 

"It  is  what  her  ladyship  would  wish,  sir,"  she 
answered. 

When  she  was  gone  the  major  took  off  his 
coat  and  then  loosened  his  collar.  He  pulled 
down  the  brass  blower  before  the  great  fire- 
place, for  the  fire  was  out,  and  a  weary  noise 
of  wind   came   from   the   great   chimney.     "So 


RING  FOR  NANCY  169 

that  there  .  .  ."  he  was  beginning  to  say.  And 
then  he  threw  up  his  hands,  and  an  expression 
of  awe-struck  panic  came  into  his  face.  "By 
heaven!"  he  called  out.  *'With  all  this  talk  of 
honors  and  morals,  four  women  have  asked  me 
to  kiss  them  this  night,  and  not  once  have  I 
brought  it  off." 


PART  II 


THE  next  two  days  were  uncomfortable, 
but  not  so  extraordinarily  uncomfortable 
as  they  might  have  been.  Indeed,  as  far  as 
the  major  was  concerned,  it  might  have  been 
better  to  call  them  merely  odd.  He  himself 
had  not  any  activities.  He  sat  about  on  knolls 
in  the  grounds,  and  tried  to  make  head  or  tail 
of  a  story  called  The  Great  Good  Place;  but 
he  just  simply  could  not  make  anything,  and 
his  eyes  were  rather  bad.  It  took  the  form  of 
a  dimness  that  would  last  two  or  three  days, 
and  then  give  place  to  two  or  three  days  in 
which  his  vision  would  be  rather  clearer  than 
usual.  So  he  really  had  not  anything  to  do,  for 
the  doctors  had  told  him  that  he  was  not  even 
to  ride  much,  and  riding  was  the  only  thing  that 
could  have  taken  him  out  of  the  grounds;  for, 
as  for  fishing,  he  could  not  really  see  well 
enough  to  tie  a  fly. 

Miss  Flossie  Delamare  spent  the  whole  of 
her  days  with  Mrs.  Foster  in  a  small  room  giv- 
ing off  the  drawing-room.  She  listened  to  in- 
terminable tales  of  the  irregular  actions  of  the 

173 


174  RING  FOR  NANCY 

dashing  Admiral  Brent;  she  did  her  best  to 
learn  Berhn  wool-work,  for  which  she  developed 
no  particular  talent,  and  she  spent  many  hours 
a  day  with  old  Mrs.  Foster  at  the  piano  in  the 
great   drawing-room,   where   the   armor   stood. 

Mrs.  Foster  was  doing  her  best  to  help  Miss 
Delamare  to  learn  her  two  songs  for  the  musical 
comedy  called  Pigs  is  Pigs.  This  successful 
piece  having  run  for  two  years  and  seven  nights, 
Miss  Delamare  had  insisted  on  a  fortnight's 
holiday,  during  which  her  place  was  taken  by 
her  friend.  Miss  Lottie  Charles.  Miss  Delamare 
said  that  that  old  play  was  driving  her  regular 
dotty,  and  she  had  insisted  on  being  provided 
with  three  new  dances  and  two  new  songs  if 
she  was  to  go  on  with  the  part.  But  by  the 
time  she  had  reached  Basildon  Manor  she  rather 
wished  she  had  not.  Because  learning  was 
extraordinarily  diflfiicult  to  her.  She  never  could 
get  words  into  her  head,  and  she  had  only  five 
notes  in  her  voice. 

The  song  called  Chipper-chipper  Chip-chip  did 
not  present  so  many  difficulties  as  far  as  Miss 
Delamare  was  concerned,  but  it  proved  ex- 
tremely difficult  for  Mrs.  Foster  to  accompany. 
The  main  body  of  the  song  had  to  be  per- 
formed by  the  hero  of  the  musical  comedy. 
This  had  not  been  the  intention  of  the  three 


RING  FOR  NANCY  175 

authors  of  the  words  and  the  two  composers 
of  the  music;  but  this  Miss  Delamare  had  in- 
sisted should  be  so. 

According  to  the  original  intention  of  the 
composers  and  the  authors,  Miss  Delamare  was 
to  have  sung  the  whole  composition,  which  was 
a  touching  story  of  the  love-affairs  of  a  tomtit 
and  a  dormouse.  But  Miss  Delamare  had  abso- 
lutely refused  to  take  so  much  trouble,  so  the 
words  had  been  handed  over  to  the  hero,  though 
Miss  Delamare  had  consented  to  sing  the  chorus 
if  it  was  very  much  simplified.  The  hero,  Mr. 
Roy  Regulin,  had  absolutely  refused  to  sing 
anything  about  a  dormouse,  or  anything  about 
a  tomtit.  He  wanted  to  sing  about  his  adven- 
tures in  walking  after  a  young  lady  with  a  band- 
box in  the  city  of  Paris.  He  was  firm,  and  Miss 
Delamare  was  firm;  so  that  in  the  end  the  three 
worried  authors  and  the  two  distracted  com- 
posers left  it  at  that,  and  a  very  good  song  it 
turned  out  to  be.  For  the  hero  related  how  he 
met  the  young  lady  with  the  bandbox  on  the 
boulevards  and  how  he  turned  and  followed  her. 
And  then  Miss  Delamare  sang: 

"But  she  only  said  ... 
*Chipper-chipper  Chip-chip.' " 

And  at  the  end  of  every  six  lines  of  this  song, 


176  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Miss  Delamare,  who  carried  a  bandbox,  sang 
her  artless  refrain. 

The  only  difficulty  was  that  old  Mrs.  Foster, 
whose  knuckles  were  very  gouty,  and  who  had 
never  in  her  youth  got  beyond  playing  Rock 
Me  to  Sleep,  Mother,  and  0  Woodman,  Spare 
that  Tree — Mrs.  Foster  found  it  extremely  dif- 
ficult to  accompany  the  young  lady,  to  whom 
she  was  much  attached.  Miss  Delamare,  on 
the  other  hand,  said  she  would  be  absolutely 
unable  to  practise  the  song  unless  Mrs.  Foster 
could  at  least  pick  out  the  melody  with  one 
finger  upon  the  grand  piano.  They  might,  in- 
deed, have  had  the  major  in,  for  he  had  some 
working  acquaintance  with  the  instrument,  and 
in  the  evenings,  when  they  were  all  prop- 
erly clothed,  he  managed  to  rattle  out  the 
tune  very  spiritedly.  But  Miss  Delamare  said 
that  she  could  not  possibly  dance  the  steps  in 
the  extraordinary  tight  skirts  that  were  all 
she  had  with  her.  So  that  it  was  not,  Mrs. 
Foster  said,  to  be  thought  of  that  he  could 
assist  at  the  rehearsals,  for  Flossie  had  not 
got  so  much  as  one  petticoat  in  all  her  eleven 
boxes.  Thus,  Mrs.  Foster,  having  had  all  the 
Indian  rugs  taken  out  of  the  great  drawing- 
room,  and  having  all  the  doors  locked  from 
half  past  eleven  till  one,  did  her  laborious  best. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  177 

This  had  two  great  advantages.  It  enor- 
mously pleased  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster,  who  was 
never  tired  of  seeing  Flossie  kick  the  tortoise- 
shell  comb  out  of  the  back  of  her  own  head; 
whereupon  her  cunningly  arranged  hair  would 
fall  all  over  her  like  a  waterfall.  And,  on 
the  other  hand,  it  simpHfied  the  task  of  Miss 
Peabody. 

Miss  Peabody,  as  the  major  had  to  observe, 
was  simply  wonderful.  She  had  the  job  of 
keeping  four  women  away  from  two  men,  and 
of  keeping  in  touch  with  the  two  men  herself 
all  the  time.  The  geographical  position  of  the 
house  did,  of  course,  aid  her.  Very  long  and 
very  low,  she  occupied  Mr.  Foster's  study  in 
the  middle,  as  a  sort  of  strategic  position.  The 
house  stood  on  a  knoll,  with  the  park  drop- 
ping away  from  the  front  and  the  kitchen 
garden  behind.  And  the  kitchen  garden  was 
so  really  a  place  of  vegetables  that  no  young 
couple  could  possibly  have  the  excuse  of  wan- 
dering into  it  to  admire  its  beauties,  since  its 
beauties  consisted  mainly  of  cabbages,  and  it 
was  too  early  in  the  year  for  the  wall  fruit 
to  have  fallen.  Thus  there  only  remained  the 
park. 
B,  Miss  Peabody  would  arrange  the  major,  with 
^K  rug  tucked   round   his   knees,   under  a   large 

I 


178  RING  FOR  NANCY 

oak.  She  would  let  him  have  the  book  called 
The  Sacred  Fount  to  read,  and  several  lumps 
of  sugar  v^ith  which  to  feed  the  deer  if  they 
came  his  way. 

And,  planted  in  the  window  of  Mr.  Arthur 
Foster's  study,  she  could  see  him  perfectly 
well,  and  if  she  caught  him  as  much  as  stand- 
ing up,  she  would  be  out  at  the  hall  door  with 
her  smelling-salts  ready  to  offer  him  before 
he  had  walked  as  much  as  five  steps.  In  the 
meanwhile,  she  knew  that  Miss  Delamare  was 
conveniently  shut  up  with  Mrs.  Foster,  and 
she  could  generally  perceive  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
ranging  the  distances  of  the  park  with  a  book 
in  her  hand,  or  leaning  her  proofs  up  against 
the  trunk  of  a  distant  tree — which  Miss  Pea- 
body  observed  she  generally  did  when  she  was 
in  the  view  of  the  major — correcting  them  in 
a  style  and  fashion  very  proper  for  a  profes- 
sional lady  writer. 

And,  on  the  other  hand.  Miss  Peabody  had 
her  thumb  well  down  upon  Mr.  Arthur  Foster. 
The  poor  old  gentleman  simply  could  not  move. 
She  had  concocted  an  enormous  plan  for  amal- 
gamating the  L.S.S.V.  and  the  B.A.A.S.  (Lon- 
don Society  for  the  Suppression  of  Vice,  and 
the  Boston  Association  for  the  Abolition  of 
Sin).      She   had   persuaded   the   old   gentleman 


i; 


RING  FOR  nancy;  179 

that,  by  amalgamating  these  two  societies,  of 
the  one  of  which  he  was  founder  and  the 
other  of  which  she  was  the  perpetual  grand 
mistress,  he  would  be  absolutely  certain  of  a 
knighthood,  if  not  even  of  a  baronetcy,  which 
would  probably  descend  to  the  major.  And  she 
kept  the  poor  old  gentleman  stuck  there  over 
her  papers  so  that  neither  Miss  Delamare  with 
her  plans  for  the  new  theater,  nor  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  with  her  arguments  in  favor  of  her  new 
play,  ever  got  a  chance  of  speaking  to  him. 
Moreover,  a  quite  definite  coldness  had  sprung 
up  between  her  and  Mrs.  Arthur  Foster,  who 
was  understood  to  back  up  Miss  Delamare 
and  the  theater.  It  had  happened  in  this  way. 
On  the  first  morning  of  their  all  breakfasting 
together,  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  had  come  down 
first  and  had  opened  a  letter  that  had  con- 
tained a  report  from  the  secretary  of  the 
L.S.S.V.  It  had  filled  him  with  real  enthu- 
siasm. He  had  not  been  able  to  refrain  from 
saying  briskly  to  her  ladyship's  own  maid, 
who  was  waiting  at  the  sideboard  because 
Saunders,  the  butler,  had  apparently  turned  his 
ankle,  slipping  on  a  rug  on  the  polished  oak 
floor  of  the  corridor,  to  which  he  was  unac- 
customed because  he  had  spent  the  last  twenty 
years    of   his    service    at   The    Pines,    Hornsey,^ 


180  RING  FOR  NANCY, 

where  the  passages  were  covered  with  linoleum 
— Mr.  Arthur  Foster  could  not  refrain  from 
reading  his  letter  aloud  to  Miss  Jenkins,  who 
stood  with  her  hands  folded  before  her  in 
front  of  the  largest  ham  she  had  ever  seen. 

"Now,  this  is  famous!"  Mr.  Foster  had  said; 
"it  is  really  excellent!  Listen  to  this,  Nancy, 
my  dear — just  listen  to  this." 

Miss  Jenkins  stood  absolutely  motionless; 
the  water  in  the  silver  kettle  hissed  pleasantly; 
the  kidneys  over  their  spirit-lamp  bubbled  and 
shook  the  silver  lid  that  covered  them. 

"This  is  from  Colonel  Hangbird,"  Mr.  Foster 
said,  "the  secretary  of  the  L.S.S.V.  that  my 
wife  is  president  of.  Colonel  Hangbird  says 
that  he  is  happy  to  be  able  to  announce  that, 
during  the  year  while  my  wife  has  been 
president  of  the  society,  and  lastly,  owing  to 
your — I  mean  my — generous  contributions  to 
its  funds,  vice  of  all  kinds  in  the  kingdom  has 
diminished  by  one  per  cent.  What  do  you 
think  of  that.   Miss   Nancy?" 

Miss  Jenkins  regarded  the  Turkey  carpet. 

"You  ought  to  be  made  a  baronet,  sir,  or  a 
knight  at  least,"  she  said.  And  then  she  asked 
disconcertingly:  "Now  how  long  would  it 
take  at  that  rate  for  vice  to  be  rooted  out  of 
the  country  altogether?" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  181 

Mrs.  Foster  was  just  coming  in  at  the  door, 
so  Mr.  Foster  said,  '*Ssh!  Ssh!"  and  then  he  ad- 
dressed his  wife  with  the  words:  "My  dear, 
here's  splendid,  here's  glorious  news!  Read  this 
letter.  Nancy  says — I  mean  it's  generally  con- 
sidered— that  I  ought  to  be  a  baronet,  or  at 
least  a  knight." 

Mrs.  Foster  took  the  letter  without  much  en- 
thusiasm. She  read  rather  slowly,  and  then 
began  upon  the  breakfast  with  which  Miss  Jen- 
kins served  them;  but  she  did  bring  out  at 
last: 

"Yes,  my  dear,  I  have  no  doubt  it  is  perfectly 
splendid,  but  I  don't  see  anything  about  a 
knighthood." 

"Oh,  that,"  Mr.  Foster  said,  "that's  just  the 
general  opinion.  Colonel  Hangbird's  report  will 
be  in  all  the  papers.  Just  think,  I  shall  be  a 
knight,  and  people  will  have  to  call  you  *my 
lady.'  " 

"I  don't  know  that  I  shall  like  that,"  Mrs. 
Foster  replied  speculatively.  "It  will  seem 
rather  odd.  But  how  long  will  it  take  to  get 
rid  of  vice  altogether  at  that  rate?  Not  so 
very  long,  I  should  think." 

Mr.  Foster  happened  to  be  coughing  over  his 
cup  of  coffee,  and  Miss  Jenkins  remarked  with 
extreme  deference: 


182  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"It  will  take  just  a  thousand  years,  ma'am." 

But  Mrs.  Foster  was  thinking  of  something 
else,  and  she  turned  eagerly  upon  her  lady- 
ship's own  maid. 

"Have  you  any  news  of  her  ladyship?"  she 
asked.  "Do,  if  you  write  to  her,  repeat  and 
repeat  it  again,  that  Mr.  Foster  and  I  would 
be  delighted  if  she  will  consider  this  house  her 
home  instead  of  going  to  the  Dower  House 
at  all.'' 

Mr.  Foster  immediately  became  exceedingly 
animated. 

"Certainly,  certainly!"  he  exclaimed;  "by  all 
means  tell  her  ladyship  that."  And  then  he 
got  up  to  run  toward  Miss  Peabody,  who  was 
entering  the  room,  and  he  continued  his  ex- 
clamation: "How  odd  it  would  be  if  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter were  *her  ladyship'  and  Lady  Savylle  were 
'her  ladyship.' . . ." 

Mrs.  Foster  said  rather  frostily:  "I  don't 
think  we  should  mention  our  titles  in  conversa- 
tion," and  she  appealed  to  Miss  Jenkins  for 
corroboration. 

Miss  Jenkins  said:     "It  isn't  usual,  ma'am." 

Mr.  Foster  appealed  to  her  rather  wistfully. 
"Still,  every  now  and  then  .  .  ."  he  said. 

Miss  Jenkins  continued  to  gaze  remorselessly 
at  the  carpet. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  183 

*'Hardly  even  every  now  and  then,  sir,"  she 
remarked. 

And  then  Mr.  Foster  spoke  to  Miss  Peabody. 

"I  don't  see,"  he  exclaimed,  "that  it  is  any 
use  having  a  title  if  it  is  never  to  be  used  to 
you." 

Miss  Jenkins  remarked:  "Of  course,  it's  a 
matter  of  taste,  sir." 

But  Miss  Peabody,  who  was  rather  flushed, 
pushed  in  between  her  host  and  her  ladyship's 
own  maid,  and  it  was  only  then,  after  having 
exhausted  this  engrossing  topic,  that  Mr.  Foster 
remembered  his  duty  to  his  guest.  His  ac- 
quaintance with  polite  conversation  came  most- 
ly from  novels,  of  which  he  had  read  several 
between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty-three, 
and  his  speeches  when  addressing  a  lady  were, 
apt  at  times  to  startle  his  hearers.  Thus  he 
remarked  now: 

"Down  before  all  the  others  and  with  the 
flush  of  youth  and  beauty  on  your  cheek!  How 
I  envy  my  nephew,  lucky  dog!" 

Mrs.  Foster,  who  was  gazing  quite  angrily  at 
the  toast-rack,  remarked:  "I  don't  believe 
you're  going  to  get  a  title,  and  I  don't  in  the 
least  want  one  for  my  own  part." 

Miss  Peabody  said  rather  fiercely:  "I  don't 
see  why  Mr.   Foster   should  not   have   a   title. 


184  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Hasn't  he  deserved  it?  Aren't  his  successes 
and  his  pubHc  services  perfectly  splendid?'* 

And  it  was  at  that  moment  that  there  v^as 
born  in  Miss  Olympia's  mind  the  idea  that  Mr. 
Arthur  Foster  must  certainly  be  made  into  a 
baronet,  with  a  special  remainder  to  his  nephew 
whom  she  was  going  to  marry.  But  Mr.  Foster 
was  pushing  into  her  hand  the  letter  from 
Colonel  Hangbird.  He  said:  "Now  just  read 
that.     Isn't  that  splendid?" 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  Olympia  commented  be- 
fore reading  the  letter:  "I  was  going  to  apol- 
ogize for  being  so  late.  I  had  rather  a  bad 
night." 

Miss  Jenkins  came  suddenly  forward  and 
asked  Miss  Peabody  if  her  coffee  was  to  her 
taste.  Miss  Peabody  paid  no  attention  what- 
ever.    She  finished  reading  the  letter. 

"Of  course,"  she  said,  without  any  signs  of 
appearing  impressed,  "of  course,  it's  satisfac- 
tory; but  it  doesn't  seem  so  much  to  me.  You 
see,  we're  used  to  so  much  larger  figures  in 
my  country.  The  last  report  of  my  Secondary 
Society — the  Boston  League  for  the  Reform  of 
Young  Men — the  B.L.R.Y.M.  as  we  call  it — 
the  last  report  showed  that  our  roll  of  members 
numbers  six  hundred  and  forty  thousand — an 
increase  of  forty  thousand  in  the  year." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  185 

"Oh,  of  course,"  Mr.  Foster  said,  with  an 
i  elaborate  politeness  in  his  air,  "the  B.L.R.Y.M. 
is  a  very  different  thing." 

"And  consider  what  it  means,"  Olympia  con- 
tinued, with  that  hard  enthusiasm  which  comes 
over  even  the  mildest  of  Americans  when  they 
talk  of  the  institutions  of  their  own  country, 
"consider  what  it  means.  Here  are  six  hundred 
and  forty  thousand  young  men  all  between  the 
ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty-five,  and  all  re- 
formed characters." 

Mr.  Foster  interrupted  with  a  rather  enthusi- 
astic "Splendid!  Splendid!  But  even  our  hum- 
ble L.S.S.V.,  which  we  hope  soon  to  be  .able 
to  call  the  R.L.S.S.V.  .  .  ." 

But  the  voice  of  Miss  Peabody,  which  had 
continued  and  which  was  growing  louder  and 
louder,  took  up  her  tale: 

"And  every  one  of  those  six  hundred  and 
forty  thousand  young  men  is  pledged  to  ab- 
stain from  drinking  alcohol,  playing  cards,  or 
any  form  of  gambling,  swearing  or  using  loose 
expressions,  attending  race  meetings" — and 
Miss  Peabody's  voice  swelled  until  it  became 
a  formidable  organ — "frequenting  theaters  or 
music-halls,  or  the  society  of  young  women 
other  than  their  mothers  unless  they  are  en- 
gaged to  them.    They  pledge  themselves  all  to 


186  RING  FOR  NANCY 

be  at  home  by  ten  o'clock  at  night,  unless  their 
professions  call  for  it  .  .  ." 

Mr.  Foster  exclaimed:    "Glorious!  Glorious!" 

But  Mrs.  Foster  put  in  with  an  amiable  de- 
termination: ''I  don't  quite  see,  my  dear,  and  I 
never  have  seen,  my  dear,  though  I  have  heard 
you  say  the  same  thing  at  least  twenty  times, 
how  young  people  are  ever  to  get  engaged  at 
all  under  your  rules.  Mayn't  they  even  know 
their  female   cousins?" 

"Oh,  yes,"  Miss  Peabody  said  in  her  most 
superior  manner;  "they  may  see  them  in  the 
presence   of   some   fitting   elderly   woman." 

"But  even  that,"  Mrs.  Foster  replied  quite 
mildly,  "must  make  it  rather  difficult  when  a 
young  man  wants  to  propose.  Perhaps  that  is 
why   the  birth-rate   in  America   is   decreasing." 

Miss  Peabody  stood  up  so  suddenly  that  she 
upset  her  large  coffee-cup. 

"Mrs.  Foster,"  she  said,  and  her  cheeks  were 
exceedingly  red,  "if  I  was  not  perfectly  sure 
that  you  were  not,  I  should  think  that  you  de- 
sired to  insult  me  by  suggesting  that  I  advocate 
race  suicide." 

"I'm  sure  I  don't  know  what  that  means," 
Mrs.  Foster  answered.  "I  may  have  been  sug- 
gesting that  you  do  advocate  it;  perhaps  you 
do.     You're   not   the   pope,   that   I   know  of — 


RING  FOR  NANCY  187 

infallible,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing;  though  they 
do  say  that  he  isn't  infallible,  after  all." 

For  a  moment  Miss  Peabody  really  looked 
quite  dangerous,  but  she  sat  down  after  she 
had   shrugged  her   shoulders. 

"Of  course" — she  addressed  herself  markedly 
to  Mrs.  Foster — "a  young  man  can  always  pro- 
pose by  letter,  preferably  addressed  to  the  par- 
ents of  his  intended.  That  is  a  very  great  ad- 
vantage, for  a  young  man  can  not  afterward 
get  out  of  his  engagement  as  he  could  if  the 
proposal  were  made  in  the  private  circum- 
stances that  are  usual  in  Europe.  I  expect  to 
see  a  complete  disappearance  of  the  Breach  of 
Promise  Suit  in  the  United  States." 

Mrs.  Foster,  who  was  really  placable  enough, 
remarked:  "Oh,  well,  my  dear,  I  have  no 
doubt  that  if  you  are  managing  the  United 
States,  they're  well  managed.  But  if  you  didn't 
sleep  well,  I  hope  there  wasn't  anything  the 
matter  with  your  room;  because,  of  course, 
that's  my  business,  and  not  these  things  that  I 
don't  understand  very  well;  though  Admiral 
Brent  was  accustomed  to  say,  that  for  all  I  was 
so  quiet,  I  could  see  as  far  over  a  millstone  as 
the  man  who  made  the  sixty-two  foot  telescope 
there  was  such  an  excitement  about  in  the  year 
1852,   which  was  two  years   after   I   was   born." 


188  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Olympia  said:  "Oh,  there  was  nothing  the 
matter  with  the  room.     I  had  anxieties." 

Miss  Jenkins  said  suddenly:  "Will  you  not 
take   some   more   coffee,   miss?" 

And  Miss  Peabody  answered  tartly:  "I  have 
already  signified  that  I  desire  more  coffee.  It 
stands  to  reason  as  I  upset  my  first  cup." 

Mr.  Foster  exclaimed:  "Anxieties,  my  hon- 
ored guest?  I  hope  not.  Not  about  money, 
or — er — about   my   nephew?" 

Miss  Jenkins  said:  "Miss  Peabody's  little 
dog  was  lost  nearly  all  night,  sir." 

"And  enough  to  make  anybody  anxious," 
Mr.   Foster  commented. 

Olympia  said  coldly:  "It  is  extraordinary 
how  servants  interrupt  in  this  country.  In  Bos- 
ton we  should  not  stand  it  for  a  minute." 

Mrs.  Foster  really  trembled  with  nervousness. 

"Oh,"  she  said,  "Miss  Jenkins  is  hardly  a 
servant.  She's  the  Lady  Savylle's  confidential 
attendant.  She  has  very  kindly  consented  to 
wait  upon  us  because  the  butler  has  a  bad  foot, 
and  though  I'm  sure  we  have  other  servants 
enough,  I  don't  think  I  should  like  to  see  them 
handle  her  ladyship's  best  breakfast  service, 
which  is  all  real  Spode,  though  I  am  sure  I 
don't  know  what  that  may  mean.  But  per- 
haps," she  continued  anxiously,  "your  little  dog 


RING  FOR  NANCY  189 

doesn't  like  your  room.  Perhaps  you  would 
like  to  change  on  that  account?" 

Again  Miss  Jenkins  interrupted. 

"Major  Foster  doesn't  like  his  room.  Per- 
haps her  lady — I  mean  Miss  Peabody — would 
like  to  change  with  him?" 

"I  shall  certainly  do  nothing  of  the  sort," 
Miss  Olympia  said. 

And  then  Mrs.  Foster  continued:  "As  for 
Edward,  I'm  perfectly  certain  he  never  gave 
anybody  any  anxiety  in  his  life,  except  when 
he  went  away  like  that.  I  had  a  long  con- 
versation with  him  last  night,  and  it  quite 
brought  the  tears  to  my  eyes.  We  have  been 
cruel  and  misjudging  to  him  all  these  years, 
and  I'm  not  going  to  sit  here  and  listen  to  sug- 
gestions that  he  cost  anybody  any  anxiety.  It's 
not  fair,  and  I  won't."  And  Mrs.  Foster,  who 
was  really  shaking  with  anger,  stood  up  and  be- 
gan to  move  along  the  table.  "I'm  sure,"  she 
exclaimed,  "if  there's  anything  I  can  do  to  make 
up  for  it  I  will;  and  it's  the  greatest  satisfaction 
to  me  to  have  him  in  this  house,  and  I  hope 
he  will  never  leave  it." 

"But  it's  Lady  Savylle's  house,"  Mr.  Foster 
said. 

"I  don't  care,"  Mrs.  Foster  repHed;  "I  don't 
care  whose  house  it  is.     It's  the  house  he  likes 


190  RING  FOR  NANCY 

best  in  the  world,  and  I  hope  he  may  never 
leave  it."  And  Mrs.  Foster  went  agitatedly  out 
of  the   room. 

It  was  not  really  a  very  comfortable  breakfast 
for  anybody.  The  major  and  Miss  Delamare 
and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  drifted  in  one  after  the 
other.  But  Miss  Peabody,  who  had  finished  her 
breakfast  at  least  half  an  hour  before,  was  peer- 
ing into  the  breakfast-room  from  behind  the 
statue  of  a  plaster  lion  that  was  gnawing  the 
head  off  of  a  plaster  serpent.  Miss  Jenkins 
was  careful  to  inform  them  of  this  fact,  ^nd 
indeed  they  could  see  George  Washington  frisk- 
ing round  the  base  of  the  statue  itself,  so  that 
they  all  sat  as  far  away  as  they  could  from  one 
another  at  the  long  table  and  spoke  hardly  at  all. 
And  after  that  they  had  a  long  day  of  the  park, 
and  the  piano,  and  the  proofs,  which  were  cor- 
rected against  tree-trunks,  all  of  them  being 
under  the  surveillance  of  Miss  Peabody.  And 
in  the  evening  the  major  and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
and  Miss  Delamare  tried  to  play  bridge,  but,  as 
Miss  Peabody  was  in  a  mood  to  unbend  and 
desired  to  learn  this  frivolous  and  innocent 
game,  they  all  retired  to  bed  at  a  quarter  to 
ten,  having  got  with  difficulty  through  one 
rubber. 

The  major  had  changed  his  bedroom  because, 


RING  FOR  NANCY  191 

as  he  remarked  to  his  aunt,  the  noise  in  the 
huge  chimney  was  distracting.  And  as  he  also 
remarked,  if  his  day  could  not  have  been  said 
to  resemble  the  dazzling  glitter  of  life  which  he 
had  not  been  accustomed  to  lead  among  the  idle 
and  dissolute  Smart  Set,  it  could  not,  on  the 
other  hand,  be  said  to  differ  very  much  from  a 
rest  cure  in  the  country  which  the  doctors  had 
recommended  him  to  take.  So  that  there,  as  he 
said,  they  all  were. 

In  this  singular  peace  three  days  passed. 
They  were  all  really  very  tired  people  on  whom 
London  had  enforced  a  desire  for  rest — all  ex- 
cept Miss  Peabody,  who  desired  not  so  much 
rest  as  a  period  for  reflection.  Miss  Peabody, 
of  course,  did  not  desire  that  any  of  Mr.  Fos- 
ter's money — which  she  regarded  as  already  her 
own — should  go  to  Miss  Delamare's  theater. 
At  least,  she  was  not  quite  sure  that  she  did  not 
desire  it.  She  had  a  natural  hatred  for  Miss 
Delamare,  as  she  had  a  natural  hatred  for  most 
people.  And  she  would  very  much  have  liked 
to  have  hit  Miss  Delamare  very  hard,  just  as 
she  would  very  much  have  liked  to  have  hit 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  harder  still.  But  when  it  came 
to  the  theater  she  was  not  quite  certain.  She 
was  even  not  quite  certain  that  she  would  be 


192  RING  FOR  NANCYi 

able,  by  any  amount  of  denunciation,  to  make 
Mr.  Foster  abandon  that  scheme — but  these 
were  not  quite  ordinary  circumstances.  Mrs. 
Foster  was  not  deeply  engaged  on  the  side  of 
Miss  Delamare,  and  although  Miss  Peabody  had 
the  greatest  contempt  in  the  world  for  Mrs.- 
Foster,  she  could  not  help  seeing  that  Mr.  Fos- 
ter was  really  extremely  afraid  of  his  wife.  And 
even  if  Miss  Peabody  had  wanted  to  smash  Miss 
Delamare  and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  over  the  inci- 
dent of  the  panel,  she  was  not  by  any  means; 
certain  that  they  could  be  proved  to  have  be- 
haved disreputably  enough  to  give  her  the  han- 
dle which  she  wanted.  She  considered  that  they 
had  been  hateful,  but  she  could  not  prove  that 
they  had  acted  disreputably,  without  at  least 
showing  that  she  herself  had  been  rather  ridicu- 
lous. 

She  had,  indeed,  had  a  haughty  interview  with 
Miss  Jenkins  on  the  following  night,  and  Miss 
Jenkins'  tale  had  so  exactly  coincided  with  the 
version  that  she  got  from  the  major  himself, 
that  Miss  Peabody  simply  did  not  see  how  she 
could  get  any  kind  of  guilt  out  of  the  pro- 
ceedings. 

And,  indeed,  she  was  not  quite  certain  that 
she  wanted  the  new  theater  suppressed.  She 
would    have    liked    to    smash    Miss    Delamare 


RING  FOR  NANCY  193 

without  smashing  the  theater.  She  had  tried  to 
point  out  to  Mr.  Foster  that  Miss  Delamare, 
whose  chief  accomplishments  were  that  she 
could  sing  five  notes  and  kick  down  her  own 
back  hair,  was  not  exactly  the  sort  of  person 
to  run  a  theater  which,  she  imagined,  would  be 
chiefly  concerned  with  the  plays  of  Ibsen  and 
Mr.  Bernard  Shaw.  But  when  she  had  pro- 
pounded this  theory  to  Mr.  Foster  it  simply  did 
not  come  off  at  all.  Mr.  Foster  was  so  entirely 
ignorant  of  any  theatrical  knowledge,  that  he 
did  not  know  the  difference  between  musical 
comedy  and  the  serious  drama.  Indeed,  the 
only  theatrical  performance  that  he  had  ever 
seen  was  that  Pigs  is  Pigs  itself,  and  this 
performance  had  so  bewildered  and  so  delighted 
him,  and  Miss  Delamare  had  kicked  about  and 
sung  with  such  grace,  and  smiled  with  such  jolly 
sweetness,  that  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  seriously 
considered  that  she  was  not  only  the  greatest, 
but  the  nicest  and  most  respectable  actress  in 
the  world. 

Mrs.  Foster,  on  the  other  hand,  had  several 
times  been  taken  to  performances  of  Shakes- 
peare by  her  sister,  the  admiral's  wife,  and 
these  performances  had  so  terrified  or  so  bored 
her,  since  they  all  appeared  to  be  gouging 
out  one  another's  eyes,  or  stabbing  some  one 


194  RING  FOR  NANCY 

else  in  the  back,  or  being  an  unpleasant  ghost, 
or  making  incomprehensible  speeches  over  skulls 
— Shakespeare,  in  fact,  had  so  terrified  and 
agonized  Mrs.  Foster,  that  when  she  came  to 
see  Pigs  is  Pigs,  and  Flossie  twirling  about 
and  squeaking  with  her  little  voice,  she  really 
thought  that  this  was,  comparatively  speaking, 
heaven.  And  she  had  already  found  Flossie  so 
kind  and  attentive,  and  as  it  were,  daughterly, 
that  she  simply  told  her  husband  that  there  was 
an  end  of  it.  He  had  simply  got  to  consider 
Miss  Delamare  as  not  only  the  greatest  actress 
in  the  world,  but  as  absolutely  the  one  most 
suited  to  manage  the  new    pure  drama. 

So  that  when  Miss  Peabody  tried  gently  to 
suggest  that  she  could  not  imagine  Miss  Dela- 
mare playing  Nora  in  A  DolVs  House,  or  the 
heroine  in  Man  and  Superman,  or,  for  the 
matter  of  that,  a  tragic  charwoman  who  had  to 
be  arrested  by  a  policeman  for  stealing  a  silver 
box  that  she  had  not  stolen,  she  found  that  Mr. 
Foster,  though  he  simply  did  not  understand 
her,  regarded  her  as  talking  almost  blasphem- 
ously, since  it  was  an  article  of  faith  in  that 
household  to  consider  that  Miss  Delamare  could 
do  anything.  Moreover,  Mr.  Foster  was  aware 
that  the  greatest  and  most  serious  Nonconform- 
ist dramatic  critic  of  the  day  had  several  times 


RING  FOR  NANCY  195 

called  Miss  Delamare  the  symphonic  embodi- 
ment of  quaint  imbecility;  and  although  Mr. 
Foster  did  not  in  the  least  understand  what  this 
meant — for  the  matter  of  that,  Miss  Delamare 
herself  did  not — it  seemed  to  be  a  satisfactory 
testimonial  to  some  sort  of  gift  and  obvious 
respectability,  since  neither  Mrs.  nor  Mr.  Fos- 
ter could  imagine  the  great  critic  praising  any- 
body who  was  not  at  least  as  respectable  as 
Mrs.  Gurney,  of  Earlham.  They  were  perfectly 
convinced  that  he  would  not  have  soiled  his  pen 
by  praising  any  one  who  was  at  all  disreputable 
— that  was  how  it  struck  them;  and  Miss  Pea- 
body  knew  quite  well  that  if  she  tried  any  fur- 
ther to  interfere  with  this  belief,  they  would 
simply  tell  her  that,  being  a  foreigner,  she  could 
not  be  expected  to  understand  an  institution  so 
thoroughly  British  as  musical   comedy. 

In  that  way  she  was  really  up  against  it,  and 
as  has  been  remarked,  she  was  not  by  any 
means  certain  that  she  wanted  to  stop  the  new 
theater  altogether.  For,  remarkable  as  it  ap- 
peared to  her,  the  prospect  of  being  married, 
which  for  many  years  had  seemed  to  her  to  be 
singularly  remote,  had  operated  in  an  extraordi- 
nary manner  in  changing  her  point  of  view. 
She  found,  when  she  questioned  herself  each 
night  over  her  diary,  that,  extraordinary  as  the 


196  RING  FOR  NANCY 

confession  seemed,  she  was  not  any  longer  half 
so  interested  in  the  suppression  of  sin.  She  had 
actually  to  write  down  in  the  pages  of  that 
locked  book  that  now  that  she  was  going  to 
have — and,  indeed,  she  was  actually  having — a 
good  time  herself,  she  was  not  so  anxious  to 
suppress  the  enjoyment  of  six  hundred  and 
forty  thousand  reformed  young  men.  Life,  in- 
deed, appeared  to  have  an  entirely  new  aspect 
for  Miss  Peabody. 

She  was  beginning  in  England  to  discover 
that  there  were  such  things  as  social  amenities, 
social  scales  and  social  advancements.  In  Bos- 
ton she  had  been  a  member  of  a  rather  dis- 
agreeable upper  six  hundred,  but  she  was  be- 
ginning to  discover  that  it  might  be  almost 
more  agreeable  in  England  to  have  the  right  to 
go  through  a  door  before  some  other  woman. 
And  she  was  beginning  to  think  that  it  must  be 
extraordinarily  sweet  to  be  called  "your  lady- 
ship." Once  or  twice  when  Miss  Jenkins  had 
given  her  this  title  by  a  slip  of  the  tongue.  Miss 
Peabody  had  positively  quivered  with  delight. 
And  Miss  Peabody  had  been  observing  the  man- 
ners and  customs  of  the  English  people  for  long 
enough  to  know  that  the  stage  in  some  singular 
way  led  to  titles.  As  far  as  she  had  been  able 
to  discover,  every  wife  of  an  actor-manager  was 


RING  FOR  NANCY  197 

always  "her  ladyship."  So  that  she  was  not 
by  any  means  certain  that  she  desired  the 
scheme  for  the  new  pure  theater  to  be  sup- 
pressed. 

And  even  her  scheme  for  the  amalgamation 
of  the  L.S.S.V.  and  the  B.A.A.S.  tended  a  Httle 
in  this  direction.  She  was  beginning  to  get 
tired  of  these  things,  and  she  was  beginning  to 
think  that  she  wanted  Mr.  Foster  to  drop  them, 
too.  She  could  not  help  seeing  that  sort  of 
thing  was  not  really  fashionable  in  England,  and 
she  imagined  that,  by  amalgamating  the  two  so- 
cieties, putting  them  under  the  managership  of 
a  professional  philanthropist  like  Colonel  Hang- 
bird  and  nominating  herself  president  and  Mr. 
Foster  vice-president — though  they  would  have 
nothing  whatever  of  the  work  of  the  associa- 
tions, they  would  get  just  as  much  as  ever  of 
the  glory,  and  at  the  same  time,  they  would 
not  have  attaching  to  them  the  sort  of  snuffy 
Nonconformist  feeling  that  she  perceived  to 
attach  to  most  British  philanthropists,  who  gen- 
erally wore  low  collars,  soft  felt  hats  and  untidy 
beards.  Since  she  had  known  and  become  en- 
gaged to  the  major,  these  adornments  of  the 
male  being  no  longer  appeared  to  her  as  desir- 
able as  they  had  done  in  the  days  when  they 
had  seemed  to  her  to  be  the  symbols  of  purity. 


198  RING  FOR  NANCY 

benevolence  and  teetotalism.  Alas!  she  no 
longer  cared  much  for  any  of  these  three 
things,  for  she  could  not  find  any  particular 
trace  of  them  in  her  "intended". 

So  that,  as  she  saw  her  future  life,  she  was 
going  to  be  a  patroness — a  haughty  and  aloof 
patroness — of  a  quite  meritorious  philanthropic 
enterprise,  and  she  was  also  going  to  be,  as 
Mrs.  Edward  Brent  Foster,  quite  a  distinguished 
figure  in  British  social  life  because  she  would 
have  so  much  influence  with  the  new  theater. 
It  was  an  entirely  different  world.  And,  indeed, 
the  only  use  that  she  had  left  for  the  labors  of 
her  old  life  was,  that  by  keeping  Mr.  Foster 
hard  at  work  on  the  amalgamating  of  the  two 
societies  that  she  intended  to  throw  over,  she 
kept  him  also  entirely  under  her  thumb,  and 
occupied  his  study,  which  commanded  a  view 
of  the  entire  parkland  territory  where  a  few 
deer  wandered  about  between  the  characters  of 
the  drama  that  she  was  engaged  in  managing. 

It  was  just  before  lunch  on  the  third  day  that 
Miss  Peabody  observed  her  ladyship's  own 
maid,  who  was  all  black  and  white  like  a  mag- 
pie in  her  cap  and  apron,  marching  straight  over 
the  greensward  in  a  bee-line  for  where  the  major 
was  sitting  under  his  oak  tree.    She  was  coming 


RING  FOR  NANCY  199 

from  the  front  door,  which  was  at  the  end,  not 
the  middle,  of  the  house.  And  Miss  Peabody 
was  out  upon  the  greensward  before  she  had 
breathed  twice.  And  then  all  sorts  of  people 
turned  up.  Mr.  Foster  looked  out  of  the  win- 
'  dow  of  his  study;  Mrs.  Foster  and  Miss  Dela- 
^^are  came  out  of  the  French  windows  of  the 
^Krawing-room ;  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  with  her  long 
^ftroofs  streaming  from  her  hands,  was  walking 
^■iwiftly  toward  the  major,  and  round  the  corner 
!^H>f  the  house,  from  the  direction  of  the  front 
^■oor,  there  appeared  no  less  than  two  police- 
^Bnen  with  bicycles,  and  a  terrific  old  gentleman 
^Bn  a  fur  coat,  who  sat  very  high  upon  an  im- 
mense horse.  And  they  all  of  them  bore  down 
upon  the  major. 

And  the  first  sound  that  struck  all  their  ears 
was  the  terrific  voice  of  the  old  gentleman,  who 
had  reined  up  his  brown  horse  within  a  yard  or 
so  of  the  major,  and  was  extending  his  arm  in 
a  splendid  gesture. 

"Officers,"  he  shouted,  "do  your  duty!  That 
is  the  man.  Arrest  him  at  once  for  drunken- 
ness, assault,  the  use  of  obscene  language  and 
theft!" 

They  all  of  them  stood  absolutely  still  in  the 
sunlight,  except  the  two  policemen,  sturdy  and 
pink-faced   fellows,   who   pushed   their  bicycles 


200  RING  FOR  NANCY 

bashfully  toward  the  major.  They  each  of 
them  touched  the  glazed  black  shades  of  their 
caps  to  him,  and  pulling  their  wallets  from 
behind  their  backs,  produced  the  one  a  blue,  the 
other  a  white  slip  of  paper;  and  each  of  them 
remarked,    *'Very   sorry,   sir;   a   summons,   sir." 

The  major  carefully  placed  his  book-mark  be- 
tween the  pages  of  The  Sacred  Founts  set  the 
book  down  on  the  brown  rug  upon  which  he 
was  sitting,  extended  his  hand  and  exclaimed 
as  he  took  the  papers: 

"That's  all  right,  that's  all  right,  my  good 
men.  Go  round  to  the  kitchen  and  get  them 
to  give  you  some  beer." 

The  two  poHcemen,  with  automatic  actions, 
swung  their  bicycles  round,  and  pushing  them 
at  their  sides,  went  away  toward  the  house- 
end. 


II 


T  was  Mr.  Arthur  Foster  who  broke  next 
the  spell  of  appalled  silence.  He  came  out 
>f  his  French  window,  and  when  he  was  near 
|hem  he  called  in  agitating  and  panting  tones: 

"What's  all  this  dreadful  thing?'' 

The  major  was  contentedly,  and  with  atten- 
tive expression,  reading  the  two  summonses 
^hile  he  leaned  his  back  against  the  trunk  of 
the  oak  tree.  But  the  old  gentleman,  who  was 
mrveying  them  all  triumphantly  from  the  top 
►f  his  immense  horse,  shouted  out: 

"This  abandoned  wretch  has  been  visited  by 
lis  country's  laws  for  the  offense  of  drunken- 
less,  assault,  the  use  of  obscene  language  and 
:heft!" 

Mr.  Foster  threw  his  hands  up  to  the  sky; 

!rs.  Foster  remarked  beneath  her  breath  that 
Edward  really  seemed  to  have  been  enjoying 
life  in  spite  of  everything;  Miss  Delamare 
paughed  so  loudly  that  she  really  had  to  hold 
ler  sides;  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  shook  her  proofs 
Lt  the  old  gentleman  and  remarked:  "You  in- 
famous old  scoundrel !"    Miss  Jenkins  stood  per- 

201 


202  RING  FOR  NANCY 

fectly  still,  looking  at  Miss  Peabody  with  a 
watchful,  attentive  and  questioning  expression; 
Miss  Peabody  stood  gazing  at  the  major  with 
enormous  eyes,  and  her  eyes  did  not  believe 
and  did  not  understand  what  they  saw. 

She  had  observed  for  one  thing,  in  a  sort  of 
dream,  that  one  of  the  policemen  had,  with  a 
sudden,  extraordinarily  stiff  and  sharp  movement, 
saluted  Miss  Jenkins  as  he  went  by,  and  Miss 
Jenkins  had  shaken  her  head  and  put  one  finger 
to  her  lips.  And,  in  a  sort  of  dream,  Miss  Pea- 
body had  noticed  these  things  with  satisfaction, 
for  she  considered  that  they  pointed  with  abso- 
lute certainty  to  the  fact  that  Miss  Jenkins  had 
a  vulgar  intrigue  with  this  policeman,  and  she 
considered  that  this  would  give  her  a  handle 
against  Miss  Jenkins,  who  was  certainly  not  the 
sort  of  person  to  be  confidential  attendant  upon 
a  lady  of  title.  She  remarked  to  herself:  "I've 
got  you,  my  lady."  And  then  she  shook  off  her 
stiffness  of  consternation  and  addressed  the 
major  in  the  following  terms.  She  stretched 
her  arms  out,  indeed,  and  was  preparing  to  fall 
upon  his  neck,  when  it  occurred  to  her  that  as 
the  major  was  sitting  against  a  tree-trunk,  that 
operation  would  be  not  only  difficult  but  prob- 
ably dangerous. 

"Edward,"  she  said,  "I  don't  for  a  moment 


RING  FOR  NANCY  203 

believe  these  odious  and  scandalous  charges; 
but  even  if  they  w^ere  proved  to  the  hilt,  believe 
that  your  battered  and  tried  heart  should  find 
upon  this  bosom  a  resting-place." 

Miss  Jenkins  looked  at  the  major  with  a  cool 
and  dispassionate  glance,  and  they  all  heard  her 
remark  to  Mrs.  Foster: 

"Well,  then,  even  that's  no  go,  ma'am."  She 
walked  away  also  in  the  direction  of  the  house- 
end,  and  Miss  Peabody  remarked  to  herself 
with  satisfaction  that  the  odious  creature  had 
certainly  gone  to  rejoin  her  policeman. 

They  all  of  them  made  the  ejaculation  that 
might  have  been  expected  of  them,  but  the 
major  sat  against  the  tree-trunk  and  just 
laughed,  while  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  voluminously 
explained  the  situation. 

"My  dear  thing,"  the  major  remarked  to  Miss 
Peabody  in  the  dog-cart — for  the  first  summons 
had  been  returnable  for  that  very  afternoon — 
"it's  remotely  possible  that  I  may  be  in  some 
sort  of  a  fix,  but  I  can  assure  you  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  my  dear  Edward,"  she  exclaimed,  and 
she  was  really  perfectly  in  earnest,  "you  don't 
need  to  assure  me  of  anything.  I  regard  you 
simply  as  a  hero — and  a  hero  for  my  sake.  I 
quite    understand    that    you    imagined    that    I 


204  RING  FOR  NANCY 

should  dislike  your  traveling  for  many  hours 
alone  with  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  And  although 
that  was  exceedingly  foolish  of  you — for  it  must 
be  obvious  that  I  haven't  a  spark  of  jealousy  in 
my  composition,  and  I  hope  I  am  above  any 
foolishness  of  that  sort — all  the  same,  you  have 
lived  entirely  in  a  conventional  world,  and  I 
quite  understand  that  it  was  just  part  of  your 
invariable  kindness  and  consideration  for  me 
when  you  pulled  that  dreadful  old  gentleman 
into  the  carriage  to  act  as  a  chaperon.  And 
I  have  no  doubt  that  you  may  have  taken  a 
little  more  champagne  than  was  exactly  good 
for  you  at  lunch  because  you  may  have  been 
taking  farewell  of  some  of  your  male  friends 

"I  assure  you,  Olympia,"  the  major  said,  "I 
was  as  sober  as  the  twenty  judges.  I  had  a 
boiled  mutton-chop  and  some  barley  water  at 
the  Rag." 

"It's  impossible,  my  dear  Edward,"  Miss 
Peabody  continued  kindly  but  firmly,  "for  me 
to  follow  out  my  train  of  thought,  or  even  to 
construct  a  grammatical  sentence,  if  you  will 
persist  in  interrupting  me  with  statements  that 
are  quite  unnecessary.  I  say  I  simply  do  not 
inquire  whether  you  had  had  too  much  cham- 
pagne or  not.    I  have  begun  to  realize,  as  with- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  205 

out  doubt  you  notice,  that  there  are  certain 
things — certain  customs  in  this  old  country 
which,  although  they  would  ill  become  a  gentle- 
man of  America,  are  nevertheless  appropriate 
and  necessary  for  a  person  of  your  position  in 
this  country.  One  of  these  customs  I  under- 
stand is,  that  when  a  young  man  is  upon  the 
point  of  marrying,  he  gives  a  farewell  entertain- 
ment— or  even  a  series  of  farewell  entertain- 
ments— to  the  bachelor  friends  of  his  youth. 
And  I  understand  that  upon  these  occasions  a 
great  deal  of  wine  is  drunk  because,  as  I  have 
been  told,  it  is  the  custom  for  every  person 
present  at  the  table  to  toast  the  bride;  where- 
upon the  young  man  must  reply  by  drinking  a 
full  glass  of  wine  with  each  person  present,  the 
phrase,  as  far  as  I  can  remember  it,  running, 
'And  no  heel-taps.' " 

"Oh,  hang  it  all,  Olympia,"  the  major  said, 
"youVe  been  reading  about  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury. Modern  people  never  touch  anything 
stronger  than  barley  water  at  lunch." 

"So  that,"  Miss  Olympia  continued  with 
equanimity,  "if  you  were  slightly — let  me  say, 
elevated — I  can  only  consider  that  you  were  in 
that  sad  condition  entirely  for  my  sake.  And 
of  course,  when  it  comes  to  the  use  of  obscene 
language,    I    must    confess    that    some    of    the 


206  RING  FOR  NANCY 

phrases  you  use,  though  in  themselves  perfectly 
innocent  and  having  no  blasphemous  or  im- 
proper significance,  are  nevertheless  singular 
and  incomprehensible.  You  are  fond,  for  in- 
stance, of  saying  that  some  one  handed  you  a 
lemon  .  .  ." 

*'Oh,  but  hang  it  all,"  the  major  interrupted, 
"that's  an  Americanism;  I  only  use  American- 
isms now  and  then  to  make  you  feel  comfort- 
able and  home-like.  Personally  I  detest  them. 
To  hand  any  one  a  lemon  means  .  .  ." 

*T  am  perfectly  well  aware  what  the  phrase 
means,"  Miss  Peabody  said.  "It  signifies  what 
in  English  we  should  term  a  rebuff  or  a  slap  in 
the  face.  But  you  must  consider,  that  to  a 
person  not  in  the  least  knowing  what  the  phrase 
may  signify,  and  casting  about  in  his  or  her 
mind  for  an  allegoric  meaning — to  such  a  per- 
son— supposing  you  should  use  the  phrase,  *She 
handed  him  a  lemon  and  he  quit,*  as  you  are 
fond  of  doing  when  you  desire  to  be  amusing — 
to  such  a  person  the  words  might  seem  to  con- 
note a  reference  to  the  fall  of  man  when  Eve 
handed  Adam  an  apple — which,  however,  was 
a  fruit  more  exactly  resembling  a  lemon  and 
not  an  apple  at  all — and  our  first  parents  were 
forced  to  leave  the  Garden  of  Eden ;  and,  as  you 
arc  aware,  to  many  old-fashioned  people,   any 


RING  FOR  NANCY  207 

reference  to  Holy  Writ  is  apt  to  be  considered 
not  only  blasphemous,  but  even  in  this  particu- 
lar case  possibly  obscene." 

"But  I  never  said  anything  about  handing 
anybody  a  lemon,"  the  major  said.  *'I  shouldn't 
among  English  people.  They  don't  like  your 
American  slang.  And  look  here,  you  say  I  was 
drunk  .  .  ."  The  major  was  about  to  enter 
upon  an  eloquent  disclaimer,  when  the  horse 
that  he  was  driving  shied  a  little  because  his 
uncle's  motor,  which  contained  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Foster,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  Miss  Delamare,  and, 
beside  the  chauffeur.  Miss  Jenkins,  passed  them 
rapidly,  being  bound  also  for  the  county  town. 
And  when  he  had  coaxed  the  horse  to  be  quiet, 
it  suddenly  occurred  to  the  major  that  to  con- 
vince his  fiancee  that  he  had  not  been  drunk, 
and  that  he  had  not  used  any  obscene  language 
at  all,  would  be  to  inflict  a  certain  cruelty  upon 
her.  For  the  lady  was  obviously  reveling  in 
the  romance  of  an  eighteenth-century  situation. 
She  had,  she  imagined,  got  hold  of  a  terrific 
lover  who  swore,  drank  with  no  heel-taps,  and 
swaggered  ferociously  about  the  world  at  the 
mention  of  his  mistress's  name.  And,  indeed. 
Miss  Peabody  continued  tranquilly: 

"I  don't  in  this  case  blame  you  for  having 
taken  too  much  champagne,  and   supposing  that 


208  RING  FOR  NANCY 

you  did  become  rather  heated  with  the  old 
gentleman  and  used  fierce  language  when  he 
objected  to  your  having  dragged  him  into  the 
railway  carriage,  all  the  same,  since  the  whole 
thing  was  for  my  sake  .  .  .'* 

"Well,  Olympia,"  the  major  said,  "you  really 
have  averaged  it  out  pretty  well.  It's  astonish- 
ing how  perspicacious  youVe  been.  I  was,  of 
course,  a  little  bit  on,  but  I'm  glad  you  see  that 
the  circumstances  demanded  it  in  your  honor. 
And,  of  course,  I  was  absolutely  determined  to 
have  some  sort  of  chaperon  for  the  sake  of 
your  peace  of  mind,  and  the  old  gentleman  did 
become  rather  violent,  and  I  did  answer  him 
back  with  some  ferocity  .  .  ." 

"I  don't  say,"  Miss  Peabody  said  softly,  "that 
it's  at  all  discreditable  to  you  .  .  ." 

"All  the  same,"  the  major  put  in,  "I  can't 
exactly  acknowledge  these  things  in  court." 

"Oh,  why  not?"  Miss  Peabody  said,  and  she 
appeared   decidedly   disappointed. 

"Oh,  well,"  the  major  answered,  "I  don't 
want  to  get  a  month." 

"I  should  be  just  the  same  to  you  when  you 
came  out,"  Olympia  remarked. 

"Of  course,  that  would  be  very  precious,"  the 
major  conceded;  "but  what  should  I  feel  like 
when    I    was    in?     Besides,    there's    Mrs.    Kerr 


'RING  FOR  NANCY  209 

Howe  to  be  considered.  She  insists  on  giving 
evidence.  She  v^ouldn't  like  it  to  appear  that 
she  traveled  with  a  drunken  and  disreputable 
companion.  She  hasn't  got  the  advantage  of 
knowing  as  you  do  that  it  was  entirely  for 
her  sake." 

"But  still  .  .  ."  Miss  Peabody  was  beginning. 

"Oh,  no,  Olympia,"  the  major  interrupted,  "I 
can't  let  it  go  so  far  as  that.  Of  course,  you're 
at  liberty  to  tell  all  your  friends  in  private  how 
creditable  the  whole  thing  really  was,  and  how 
pleasing  it  must  naturally  be  to  you.  But  I  am 
afraid  I've  got  to  defend  it.  I've  wired,  in  fact, 
to  the  guard  of  the  train  to  come  and  give  evi- 
dence, and,  of  course,  that  good  fellow,  not 
being  particularly  quick  in  his  perceptions,  will 
give  evidence  that  I  was  as  sober  as  the  twenty 
judges  I  have  just  mentioned." 

"I  must  say  that  is  rather  disappointing." 
Miss  Olympia  gave  up  the  contest.  "But  I  will 
say  this,  Edward,  that,  whatever  happens,  I  am 
thoroughly  and  entirely  convinced  of  your  chiv- 
alrous attachment  to  myself,  and  that  I  have 
nothing  in  the  world  to  complain  of  with  re- 
gard to  your  own  proceedings,  whatever  I  may 
have  to  say  of  other  people.  I  never  till  now 
met  a  man  with  whom  I  was  so  entirely  satis- 
fied, and  I  don't  suppose  I  ever  shall   again." 


210  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Well,  of  course,  it  would  be  rather  awkward 
if  you  did,"  the  major  said.  He  gazed  hard  at 
the  polished  metal  that  decorated  the  horse's 
breeching-strap,  and  he  remained  lost  in  reflec- 
tion. A  speck  of  dust  flew  into  his  tender  eye, 
and  he  realized  that  he  ought  not  to  have  been 
driving  at  all.  But  he  had  wanted  to  have  a 
talk  with  Olympia.  He  had  had  it.  Of  that 
there  could  be  no  doubt. 

He  set  down  Miss  Peabody  on  the  front  step 
of  the  County's  Meet  Hotel,  where  the  rest  of 
the  party  were  awaiting  them,  and  then  he 
drove  round  into  the  inn  yard  to  give  up  the 
horse  to  a  hostler.  His  eye  was  really  hurting 
him  so  much  that  it  was  all  he  could  do  to  find 
his  way  into  the  private  bar,  for  very  decidedly 
he  needed  a  drink.  The  bar  was  rather  dark, 
and  an  amiable  barmaid  gave  him  a  whisky  and 
soda,  and  then  inspected  his  eyelid  which  he 
pulled  down,  to  see  if  she  could  discover  the 
speck  of  dust.  At  the  other  end  of  the  coun- 
ter a  man,  whom  he  made  out  only  dimly,  was 
talking  to  a  lady  whom  he  could  not  make  out 
at   all. 

"I  can't  say,  ma'am,"  the  man  said.  "I 
didn't  intend  to  go  on  the  bench  at  all  to-day. 
I  just  meant  to  sit  in  the  well  of  the  court  and 
take  notes." 

The  major  could  not  hear  what  the  lady  said 


RING  FOR  NANCY  211 

beneath  her  breath.  He  only  caught  the  name 
"Mr.  Broadrib,"  and  he  recognized  that  the 
other  man  was  the  labor  member  of  ParHa- 
ment  for  one  of  the  three  constituencies  that 
met  in  that  part  of  the  world. 

"It's  no  use  talking  any  nonsense,  ma'am," 
Mr.  Broadrib  said  in  his  metallic  voice.  *'The 
bench  is  set  on  giving  your  friend  three  months. 
And  they'll  make  it  six  if  they  get  any  kind 
of  a  chance.  I  tell  you  plainly  they  won't  if 
I  can  stop  it,  but  I  don't  know  whether  I  can." 

Again  the  lady  said  something. 

"It's  no  good  my  going  on  the  bench,"  Mr. 
Broadrib  said,  "if  I'm  to  be  out-voted  when 
they  retire  to  consider  their  decision.  You 
don't  know  the  extraordinary  old  crowd  of  od- 
dities they've  got  together.  You  know  perfectly 
well  that  the  Lord  Chancellor's  hand  has  been 
forced  so  that  he  daren't  appoint  any  Conserva- 
tive J.P.'s  in  this  part  of  the  world.  And  in 
this  part  of  the  world  there's  not  a  Liberal 
that's  got  threepence-halfpenny  a  week  to  his 
name.  I  quite  agree  with  your  ladyship  that 
it's  a  shame  there  shouldn't  be;  but  you  know 
what  these  country  districts  are,  and  except  in 
my  constituency,  you  are  the  only  person  who 
dare  call  herself  a  Liberal  for  fear  of  losing  the 
bread  and  butter  out  of  her  mouth.  So  the 
Lord  Chancellor  has  to  fall  back  upon  cranks. 


212  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"It's  a  most  extraordinary  sight,  our  bench. 
They've  all  got  beards  like  morning  mists  and 
hair  like  sheep's  wool  that's  never  been  combed. 
But  there  it  is.  There's  Mr.  Justice  Hills,  He's 
a  judge  of  King's  Bench,  and  he  goes  mad  at 
the  sight  of  an  Irishman.  And  I  understand 
your  friend  is  an  Irishman.  And  there's  Sir 
Arthur  Johnson.  Of  course,  as  he's  the  prose- 
cutor, he  ought  not  to  sit  on  the  bench,  but 
he'll  probably  make  a  jolly  good  shot  at  doing 
so,  and  you  never  know  what  these  country 
justices  won't  do.  Then  there's  Christopher 
Sharp,  the  Privy  Councilor.  You  know  him. 
He's  a  millionaire  squire,  and  he  goes  mad  at 
the  sight  of  any  man  with  a  decent  coat  on  his 
back.  Socialism  of  the  cracked  variety!  And 
there's  the  Honorable  Charles  Widgeon.  He's 
the  second  son  of  the  field-marshal.  He's  the 
gentleman  who  accused  Thomas  Atkins  of  spit- 
ting twenty  thousand  Boer  babies  with  bayonets 
during  the  South  African  War.  He  goes  mad  at 
the  sight  of  a  soldier.  So,  I'm  afraid,  whatever 
happens,  your  friend  is  pretty  sure  of  three 
months,  and  just  as  likely  as  not  it  will  be  six." 

The  lady  whispered  again. 

"I  tell  you,  your  Ladyship,"  the  man's- voice 
repeated,  "that  it  wouldn't  be  the  least  use.  I 
should  only  be  one  against  three  or  four  if  I 


RING  FOR  NANCY  213 

\\  sat  on  the  bench.  They'd  out-vote  me.  The 
[\  very  most  that  I  can  do  is  to  listen  to  the  evi- 
dence from  the  v^ell  of  the  court,  and  telegraph 
to  the  home  secretary  the  moment  the  sen- 
tence is  pronounced." 

The  major,  rubbing  his  sore  eyes,  heard  the 
lady's  voice  say  clearly  and  distinctly: 

"Why  not  telegraph  to  him  at  once  as  if  the 
sentence  had  been  pronounced?  Then  he  might 
suspend  judgment  before  it  is  uttered." 

Mr.  Broadrib  pushed  his  bowler  hat  back  on 
his  head. 

"That's  an  idea,"  he  said;  "that's  certainly 
an  idea.  I  have  already  written  to  the  home 
secretary  giving  him  the  details  of  the  case. 
The  point  is,  that  we  can't  have  these  tribunals, 
which  are  supposed  to  be  Liberal,  though  they 
certainly  aren't,  be  made  to  appear  ridiculous. 
Now  can  we,  your  Ladyship?" 

Again  the  lady  said  clearly:  "I  should  think 
it  would  be  extremely  bad  for  the  party." 

And  the  major  really  started.  His  eyes  were 
no  longer  watering,  but,  before  each  of  them, 
was  the  fatal  round  blur  like  a  mist  that  had 
ruined  his  career.  He  could  not  see  the  bar- 
maid's face;  he  could  not  see  Mr.  Broadrib's 
face;  by  looking  quickly  downward  he  seemed 
to  be  able  to  dodge  the  blur  and  to  see  for  a 


214  RING  FOR  NANCY 

moment  his  own  hands.  But  that  was  as  far 
as  it  went. 

Mr.  Broadrib  struck  the  bar  counter  with  his 
fist.  "It's  certainly  an  idea,"  he  said;  and  then 
he  added:  "Give  me  a  minute  or  two  to  think 
about  it.  I  was  never  the  one  to  desert  a 
friend,  and  you  fought  Hke  a  Trojan  for  me  at 
the  election.  If  I  can  think  of  a  form  of  words, 
I  certainly  will  telegraph  to  the  home  secre- 
tary within  these  five  minutes." 

The  lady  suddenly  disappeared  in  the  deep 
shadows  through  a  little  door  that  led  into  the 
hotel.  Mr.  Broadrib  sat  still,  looking  abstract- 
edly at  three  scarlet  claret  glasses  that  formed 
the  decoration  just  under  his  nose. 

"I  say,"  the  major  finally  addressed  him, 
"who  did  you  happen  to  be  talking  about?" 

"About  a  man,"  Mr.  Broadrib  said,  "called 
Major  Edward  Brent  Foster." 

"Well,  that's  me,"  the  major  said. 

"Of  course,  I  knew  it  was,"  Mr.  Broadrib 
answered.  "I  thought  you  might  like  to  know 
how  the  land  lay,  or  I  should  not  have  talked 
like  that  in  a  bar." 

The  major  said,  "Oh!"  and  then:  "Fm  very 
much  obliged."  Then  he  asked:  "And  that 
lady  who  appeared  to  be  interested  in  me — 
who  was  she?" 


I 


RING  FOR  NANCY  215 

"That  was  Lady  Savylle,  of  Higham,"  Mr. 
Broadrib  said.     "She's  an  old  friend  of  mine." 

"Well,  she  was  always  a  confounded  Radical/* 
the  major  commented.     "She  can  afford  to  be." 

And  then  he  made  a  clumsy  rush  toward 
the  dark  door  through  which  the  lady  had  dis- 
appeared. He  upset  three  high  cane  stools  and 
stumbled  over  a  copper  spittoon.  Then  he  felt 
his  arm  grasped  by  Mr.  Broadrib. 

"Look  here,  my  friend,"  the  Liberal  member 
said,  "you  are  not  going  into  court  drunk,  are 
you?" 

"I'm  not  drunk,"  the  major  answered  him. 
"I'm  going  blind."  He  tried  to  look  at  Mr. 
Broadrib,  but  he  could  not  see  him.  "In  the 
service  of  my  grateful  country,"  he  added. 

Mr.  Broadrib  grasped  his  arm  firmly  by  the 
elbow. 

"Then  you  had  better  let  me  take  you  into 
:ourt,"  he  said.     "Come  along  with  me." 

He  marched  the  major  off. 


Ill 

^TpHE  Lady  Savylle,  of  Higham,  was  per- 
•*•  mitted  by  the  manager  of  the  County's 
Meet  Hotel  to  watch  the  proceedings  in  court 
from  the  little  generally  disused  door  that  com- 
municated from  one  of  the  upper  passages  of 
the  old  hotel  with  the  court  room  of  the  old 
town  hall.  In  the  old  days  the  county  magis- 
trates had  been  used  to  permit  any  smugglers 
that  were  brought  before  them  to  escape  up  a 
little  staircase  running  up  the  wall  behind  their 
worships*  backs.  If  there  looked  to  be  any 
strong  evidence  against  the  smugglers,  one  of 
the  magistrates  would  just  wink  at  them,  and 
these  hardy  and  desperate  fellows,  as  the  news- 
papers of  the  day  used  to  put  it,  would  elude 
the  attention  of  their  guards,  rush  behind  the 
magistrates'  bench  up  the  little  wooden  stair- 
case, and  through  the  little  door  into  the  hotel 
corridor.  And  the  door  would  be  slammed  in 
the  faces  of  the  constables,  who  were  never  in 
any  particular  hurry  to  get  their  noses  pinched. 
Nowadays  the  staircase  had  been  taken 
down,  but  the  door  remained,  and  Lady  Savylle 

216 


RING  FOR  NANCY  217 

had  heard  of  its  existence  from  a  waiter  who 
had  been,  man  and  boy,  sixty  years  in  the  serv- 
ice of  the  hotel.  She  had  given  the  waiter  half 
a  sovereign,  and  had  had  the  door  opened  just 
a  little  so  that  she  could  see  well  down  into  the 
court.  The  court  was  a  dilapidated  place  of  old 
panels  and  decayed  woodwork.  The  smell  that 
came  up  from  it  was  none  of  the  pleasantest, 
but  the  view  was  quite  good.  There  were  a 
number  of  people  in  the  court:  Mr.  Foster  and 
his  party,  some  reporters,  a  rat-catcher  in  vel- 
veteen, and  an  old  mad  lady  who  muttered  and 
winked.  Five  quite  old  gentlemen  sat  on  a 
raised  platform.  Four  of  them,  indeed,  had,  in 
the  words  of  Mr.  Broadrib,  beards  like  morn- 
ing mist  and  hair  like  uncombed  sheep's  wool. 
Mr.  Justice  Hills,  however,  the  chairman  of  the 
bench,  was  so  exceedingly  bald  and  so  clean- 
shaven, that  his  head  appeared  to  have  been 
skinned.  And  all  the  five  of  them  had  heavy 
expressions,  drooping  eyelids  and  airs  of  buoy- 
ant ill-temper.  The  clerk  to  the  justices,  a  dis- 
mal man  in  a  very  dirty  collar,  appeared  more 
depressed  than  anybody  else.  There  were  sev- 
eral policemen  about  the  court,  and  an  old  man 
in  a  very  ragged  gown.  Lady  Savylle  felt  her- 
self to  be  in  the  presence  of  the  legal  powers  of 
her  country  in  formidable  array. 


218  ORING  FOR  NANCY 

They  dismissed  the  cases  against  three  poach- 
ers, threatening  to  have  the  gamekeepers  who 
appeared  against  them  prosecuted  for  perjury 
and  forgery.  They  sentenced  a  publican,  who 
was  accused  of  permitting  drunkenness  on  his 
premises,  to  ten  days'  imprisonment  without 
the  option  of  a  fine.  But  this  sentence  the  clerk 
of  the  court  proceeded  to  revise.  They  disa- 
greed energetically  about  a  case  in  which  the 
defendant  was  said  to  have  contravened  the 
regulations  against  swine  fever;  for  two  of  the 
magistrates  professed  themselves  anarchist  in- 
dividualists, and  said  that  the  law  was  prepos- 
terous, while  Sir  Arthur  Johnson  absolutely 
refused  to  take  the  evidence  of  any  inspector. 
So  that  case  was  adjourned.  Then  Lady  Sav- 
ylle  heard  a  weak  voice  bleat: 

"Call  Edward  Brent  Foster." 

The  major  was  stepping  into  a  sort  of  high 
pew,  and  a  great  deal  of  bustle  began;  she  could 
see  one  of  the  reporters  sharpening  his  pencil 
with  great  jerks,  and  she  wondered  why  he  had 
not  got  a  fountain-pen.  And  there  really  was 
a  moment  when  Sir  Arthur  Johnson  seemed 
inclined  to  sit  on  the  bench,  but  he  descended 
to  the  witness-box  and  gave  extraordinary  and 
violent  evidence,  and  with  many  gestures  of  a 
sweeping  nature  so  that  he  resembled  a  splen- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  219 

did  viking.  And  the  story  he  had  to  tell  was 
so  coherent  and  so  extravagant,  that  Lady 
Savylle  really  thought  that  the  major  must 
have  been  committing  mad  crimes.  She  had 
the  emotions  of  a  person  reading  a  wild  Irish 
book;  for  Sir  Arthur  had  a  most  tenacious 
memory,  and  repeated  phrase  after  phrase  of 
the  major's  with  the  accuracy  of  a  shorthand 
reporter.  i 

The  major  called  the  railway  guard,  who 
swore  that  the  major  was  perfectly  sober,  and 
in  addition,  that  Sir  Arthur  was  always  getting 
into  adventures  on  the  six  forty-eight.  But  the 
justices  would  not  permit  him  to  continue  that 
part  of  his  evidence.  Then  the  major  called  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe,  who  was  at  once  put  into  a  violent 
rage  by  her  own  particular  problem.  For  she 
was  too  frightened  of  the  major's  uncle  to  declare 
that  she  was  engaged  to  the  major,  and  extra- 
ordinarily unwilling  to  declare  that  she  was  not. 
And  then  the  justices  cut  her  short  and  sent 
her  out  of  the  witness-box.  What  the  impres- 
sion she  had  made  on  the  court  was.  Lady 
Savylle  could  not  gather;  and  no  one  there  had 
any  say  in  the  affair  but  the  justices,  so  that  it 
did  not  really  matter.  The  trial,  indeed,  though 
it  was  eccentric  enough,  was  not  in  the  least 
thrilling   except    for    the    imposing   attitude    of 


220  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Sir  Arthur,  and  except  for  Sir  Arthur's  evi- 
dence, it  did  not  take  seven  minutes — two  for 
the  railway  guard,  two  for  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
and  three  for  the  major. 

The  major  went  into  the  witness-box  and 
leaned  engagingly  over  the  rail  when  he  had 
taken  the  oath.  The  presiding  justice  told  him 
to  stand  up,  and  he  stood  at  attention.  Then 
he  began  to  speak. 

"I  was  traveling  by  the  six  forty-eight,"  he 
said,  "and  without  the  beginnings  of  a  reflec- 
tion on  her,  I  was  anxious  not  to  be  alone  with 
the  lady  who  has   just  gone  out  of  the  box." 

The  presiding  justice  snapped  out,  "Why?" 
and  Sir  Arthur  Johnson  from  the  well  of  the 
court  called  out: 

"That  shows  the  sort  of  fellow  this  is!"  And 
then  majestically  he  looked  all  round  him. 

"What  we  want  to  know,"  the  tired  but 
ferocious  gentleman  on  the  right  of  the  bald 
chairman  asked,  "is  whether  you  did,  or  did 
not,  entice  the  prosecutor  into  your  compart- 
ment.?" 

"I  invited  him,"  the  major  said.  "I  had  half 
a  hazy  notion  that  I  knew  him." 

"You  admit,  then,  that  you  were  hazy?"  the 
tired  but  ferocious  gentleman  on  the  left  of  the 
presiding  justice  asked. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  221 

"I  admit  nothing  of  the  sort,"  the  major  said. 
"I  wanted  a  companion;  the  old  gentleman 
wanted  a  first-class  corner  seat.  I  had  a  re- 
served carriage  and  I  offered  him  what  he 
wanted." 

"You  admit  to  being  drunk,"  the  chairman 
said.  "You  admit  to  enticing  the  prosecutor 
into  your  compartment.  Did  you,  or  didn't 
you,  stamp  on  his  toes?" 

"Of  course  I  stepped  on  his  toes,"  the  major 
said;  "but  it  was  the  merest  accident.  You 
might  have  done  it." 

The  Lady  Savylle  suddenly  had  tears  in  her 
eyes;  she  did  not  know  why  it  was.  She  was 
looking  down  upon  him,  and  he  was  tired  and 
dispirited;  and  she  felt  that  he  did  not  care — he 
did  not  care  for  anything  so  long  as  he  shielded 
the  reputations  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  and  Miss 
Delamare,  and  the  feelings  of  Miss  Peabody. 
She  wiped  her  eyes  suddenly,  for  she  just  had 
to  wipe  them.  It  affected  her  like  a  story  she 
had  read  frequently  in  Christmas  supplements 
— a  story  in  which  a  clown  keeps  his  end  up 
thoroughly  before  the  footlights  while  his  little 
daughter  is  dying  at  home  of  pneumonia  and 
starvation.  There  was  Edward  Brent  Foster 
playing  his  part;  amiably  and  in  a  voice  that 
just  moved  her  bones.     (It  felt  really  like  that. 


222  RING  FOR  NANCY 

When  he  spoke  she  seemed  to  have  little  elec- 
tric currents  running  down  the  very  bones  of 
her  arms  and  feet.)  He  v^as  just  talking  to 
those  farcical  old  men.  And  yet  for  half  a 
dozen  reasons  he  must  have  misery  in  his  heart. 

"So  that  you  admit,"  the  voice  of  the  bald 
gentleman  v^as  saying,  "to  drunkenness,  entic- 
ing and  assault.  Now  about  the  theft  from 
the   book-stalls  .  .  ." 

The  clerk  to  the  justices  looked  up  from 
below   and   said: 

"Really,  my  lord,  that  is  a  case  upon  another 
summons  and  in  another  court.  Your  Wor- 
ships can  not  try  that!" 

"It's  a  question  as  to  the  credit  of  the  wit- 
ness," Sir  Arthur  thundered.  The  three  old 
men  had  all  whispered  together,  and  then  with 
an  astonishing  swiftness  the  chairman  remarked: 

"Two  months  for  the  assault,  two  months  for 
the  drunkenness,  and  two  for  the  use  of  blas- 
phemous and  obscene  language.  The  decencies 
of  life  must  be  maintained  against  these  liber- 
tines. The  sentences  to  run  consecutively." 
And  then  he  added:  "Call  the  next  case!"  and 
fell  back  into  his  chair  as  if  he  were  exhausted 
to  the  point  of  death.  This  was  his  favorite 
attitude  when  he  had  disposed  of  a  case  in  the 
King's  Bench. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  223 

It  was  then  that  Miss  Delamare  fainted.  She 
fell  right  off  the  bench  on  which  she  had  been 
sitting  with  a  thud,  but  with  no  other  sound. 
And  she  was  so  pretty,  and  so  picturesque,  that 
the  policeman  who  had  been  suggesting  to  the 
major  that  he  should  leave  the  dock  and  go 
into  the  door  marked  "Prisoners,"  ran  away  to 
get  a  glass  of  water.  Sir  Arthur  exclaimed: 
"Infamous!"  though  it  was  not  clear  whether 
his  remark  was  addressed  to  the  policeman  or 
to  Miss  Delamare;  and  some  one  bleated,  "Si- 
lence !"  to  no  one  in  particular.  And  then  Mary 
Savylle  saw  a  telegraph  boy  wandering  along 
the  high  backs  of  the  pen  that  contained  the 
court.  He  looked  about  stupidly,  and  in  her 
excitement  she  called  down: 

"Mr.  Broadrib  is  there!  Mr.  Broadrib's 
there!" 

And  she  found  that  she  had  opened  the  door 
and  was  out  on  the  little  gallery  trying  to  at- 
tract the  attention  of  the  labor  member.  And 
the  only  person  who  saw  her  was  the  major, 
who  looked  up  and  exclaimed: 

"Mary!     By  God,  Mary!" 

His  eyes,  which  had  been  rested  because  he 
had  closed  them  long  and  frequently  while  he 
waited  for  his  case  to  come  on,  had  for  just  a 
moment   grown   clearer.      He   kicked   open   the 


224  RING  FOR  NANCY 

door  of  the  dock,  jumped  clear  over  the  form 
of  Miss  Delamare,  and  stumbled  against  Sir 
Arthur  Johnson,  who  had  set  his  shoulder 
toward  the  major  as  if  he  were  an  association 
footballer  resisting  a  charge.  It  was  extraor- 
dinarily quick.  Sir  Arthur  had  grasped  the 
major's  shirt  collar,  and  before  Lady  Savylle 
could  understand  what  they  were  doing,  a 
white  linen  circlet  was  in  the  irrepressible  old 
gentleman's  hand,  and  the  major  was  tumbling 
over  the  telegraph  boy  in  the  outer  passage. 
But  he  picked  himself  up.  And  then  her  lady- 
ship turned  and  ran. 

She  went  down  the  gallery  like  a  lapwing, 
and  turned  up  some  very  moldy  stairs;  she 
found  herself  in  a  corridor  that  had  two  of  its 
windows  broken,  and  the  panes  stuffed  with 
straw.  She  pushed  open  a  dilapidated  white- 
washed door  and  she  heard  a  scream.  A  ser- 
vant in  her  bodice  and  petticoat  was  washing 
her  neck  at  a  cracked  basin. 

She  exclaimed:  "I'm  Lady  Savylle.  Lock 
the  door." 

The  servant  shivered.  "I  know  your  lady- 
ship," she  said,  "but  I  don't  believe  the  door's 
got  a  lock." 

"Then  put  the  chest  of  drawers  in  front  of  the 
door,"  her  ladyship  commanded.     "A  man  will 


RING  FOR  NANCY  225 

be  breaking  in  here — a  wild   tearing  Irishman!" 

The  girl  shivered  "Oo-oo-oo !"  and  sank  down 
upon  her  truckle-bed.  And  the  whole  back  of 
the  chest  of  drawers  came  out  when  Mary  Sav- 
ylle,  who  was  strong  enough,  just  turned  it 
round  and  set  it  against  the  rotten  door.  The 
floor  was  encumbered  with  the  girl's  clothes, 
cardboard  boxes,  and  hairpins  in  an  immense 
profusion.  It  was  as  if  the  poor  girl  who  pos- 
sessed nothing  else  in  the  world  had  spent  the 
whole  of  her  poor  fortune  on  these  implements 
of  decoration.  She  took  her  hand  off  her  heart 
and  remarked: 

"Your  ladyship  give  me  sich  a  turn!"  And 
then  she  added:  "But  I  understand  it  all!  Your 
ladyship   is   pursued  by   a   too    ardent   suitor!" 

"That's  what  they'd  say  in  novelettes,"  Mary 
commented.  "But  he's  not  really  a  bit  too  ar- 
dent— only  the  moment  is  inconvenient.  He 
has  been  sentenced  to  six  months'  labor." 

"Oh,  poor  dear,"  the  servant  said.  "Them 
crule  police!"  Suddenly  she  jumped  off  the 
bed.  "If  a  gentleman's  coming  here  it's  best 
he  shouldn't  see  me  in  my  naked  neck  and 
shoulders,"  she  exclaimed,  and  she  got  herself 
into  a  black  costume  that  had  rusty  brown  pas- 
sages and  white  split  seams.  Her  ladyship  was 
listening. 


I 


226  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"There's  a  noise,"  she  said. 

"Then  the  sooner  I  make  meself  decent," 
the  girl  continued,  "the  better  for  us  all.  I 
shouldn't  like  a  gentleman  to  see  me  without 
my  cap  and  apern."  She  was  covering  up  the 
deficiencies  of  her  attire  in  a  passably  clean 
frilled  apron,  when   Mary  Savylle   asked: 

"Isn't  there  anything  else  we  could  put 
against  the  door?" 

"Nothing,"  the  girl  answered,  with  a  pro- 
found conviction.  "For  the  bed,  if  you  do  seek 
to  move  him,  all  his  legs  they  do  fall  off,  and 
the  washer-stand  do  be  nailed  against  the  wall, 
having  but  two  to  its  body,  and  the  way  it  do 
spill  water  is  too  tragic,  for  I  suppose  you 
wouldn't  want  your  ardent  suitor  to  get  wet." 

At  that  moment  the  Lady  Savylle  could  not 
have  said  what  had  brought  her  there.  She 
must,  she  supposed,  have  acted  in  a  sudden 
panic  such  as  makes  the  eternal  woman  flee 
from  the  eternal  man  who  in  primeval  days  did 
his  courting  with  a  stone  ax. 

"Well,  I  suppose  I  had  better  be  going,"  she 
said. 

"There's  some  one  on  the  stairs,"  the  girl 
cried  out.  And  then  she  began  to  scream.  She 
screamed  like  the  whistle  of  a  locomotive;  she 
screamed  like   the   maddest  wind  in  ten  thou- 


'Your   ladyship  give   me   sich   a   turn 


RING  FOR  NANCY  22Z 

sand  telegraph  wires.  The  Lady  Savylle  shut 
her  ears  hard,  and  saw  the  rotten  door  fall  over 
the  chest  of  drawers;  then  the  chest  of  drawers 
fell  over,  letting  out  new  streams  of  unsus- 
pected hairpins;  and  then  the  major  was  tramp- 
ling over  the  chest  of  drawers  that  dissolved 
leneath  his  feet.  He  plunged  on  the  girl  in  her 
ip  and  apron,  and  shouted  out: 
l"Mary,  darling,  I've  got  you  now!  This 
ily  disguise  can't  deceive  me  any  more." 
The  girl  continued  to  scream  systematically, 
[onotonously  and  without  emotion,  as  if  she 
ire  a  pig  being  taken  to  market  and  having 
le  time  of  its  life,  while  the  major  held  her 
a  firm   grasp. 

And  then  the  word  "Infamous!"  sounded 
irough  the  room.  Sir  Arthur  Johnson,  quite 
It  of  breath  but  still  triumphant,  was  crash- 
ing through  the  remains  of  the  drawers  and 
the  cardboard  boxes.  He  roared:  "This  is 
the  sort  of  thing!  Seduction  of  a  poor  servant 
in  the  very  arms  of  justice!"  And  then  he 
cried:     "Officers,  come  up!" 

The  Lady  Savylle  moved  across  to  the  major. 
She  touched  his  arm  that  encircled  the  girl, 
and  said  in  his  ear: 

"If  you  want  Mary  Savylle,  I  am  Mary  Sav- 
ylle!" 


228  RING  FOR  NANCY 

He  looked  round  at  her  with  an  unseeing 
glance. 

"I  can't  see  you,"  he  said.  "I  only  saw  the 
cap  and  apron.  Because  they/re  white,"  he 
added. 

His  arms  released  the  servant,  and  she  sank 
down  on  the  bed.  The  bed  collapsed  like  an 
over-burdened  camel,  and  there  were  two 
frightened  policemen  in  the  doorway.  Sir  Ar- 
thur thundered:  "Officers,  advance!"  and  the 
girl  stopped  screaming.  It  was  as  if  a  tap  in 
her  had  been  turned  off,  and  the  sudden  silence 
was  like  a  pain. 

The  major  looked  unseeingly  at  the  girl. 
'*You  must  be  her  ladyship's  maid!"  he  ex- 
claimed with  a  sort  of  wonder  and  awe.  "What 
an  extraordinary  thing." 

"Fve  got  too  weak  a  heart,"  the  girl  an- 
swered. "The  doctor  he  say  that  excitement 
would  kill  me.  But  it's  worth  it  to  be  her 
ladyship's  maid  and  live  in  a  novelette  and 
then  die  sudden!" 

The  major  repeated  in  an  awed  voice: 

"Extraordinary!  though  the  other  night  .  .  . 
I  could  have  sworn  the  other  night  .  .  ."   Then  i 
he  tried  to  look  at  Mary  Savylle.     "I  can't  see  i 
you,"  he  said.     "It's  the  exertion.     It's  affected 
my  circulation!     My  eyes  are  full  of  blood!" 


RING  FOR  NANCY  229 

Sir  Arthur  shouted:  "Enough  of  this  blas- 
phemous foolery!     Officers,  do  your  duty!" 

The  frightened  policemen  did  nothing  at  all. 
Mr.  Broadrib  walked  into  the  room;  he  took 
hold  of  the  major's  elbow. 

*'You'd  better  go  back  to  the  dock,"  he  said 
in  metallic  but  calm  tones.  "TheyVe  deter- 
mined to  revise  your  sentence."  He  added  to 
one  of  the  policemen:  "Here,  you!  Lead  this 
gentleman  back  to  the  dock.  Be  careful  with 
him;  he's  blind." 

And  the  major  was  led  away  with  his  dazed 
and  puzzled  expression.  The  Lady  Savylle 
looked  at  Mr.   Broadrib. 

"Oh,  my  good  man!"  she  exclaimed,  and  her 
face  was  lamentable.     "If  he's  blind  .  .  ." 

And  suddenly  she  stretched  out  her  arms  and 
fell  upon  Mr.  Broadrib's  broadcloth  shoulder. 
She  wept  passionately  and  passionately. 

"There!  There!"  Mr.  Broadrib  said  in  the 
tones  of  an  old  woman  comforting  a  child  for 
a  lost  doll.  "It's  curable!  I've  seen  many  cases 
of  it  in  Africa.  Only  make  him  a  happy  man 
and  let  him  live  at  ease  .  .  ." 

The  servant,  who  had  begun  to  cry,  crawled, 
sitting,  along  her  broken  bed  and  began  to  kiss 
Lady  Savylle's  motionless  hand  that  hung 
against   Mr.   Broadrib's  side. 


230  RING  FOR  NANCY 

*'If  faithful  service  though,  with  but  a  weal 
heart,  for  the  doctor  he  says  it  is  so  .  .  ."  shd' 
began  to  blubber  out,  and  she  pressed  her  wet 
cheek  against   the   hand. 

But  Sir  Arthur  Johnson,  who  had  remained 
triumphant  and  majestic,  exclaimed  to  the  two 
women : 

"Now  you  perceive  the  results  of  debauchery 
and  feather-headedness.  That  infamous  scoun-  i 
drel  is  struck  blind  in  the  midst  of  his  excesses; 
he  is  overwhelmed  by  the  laws  of  his  country, 
and  you  are  two  betrayed  and  abandoned 
women  .  .  ." 

Mr.  Broadrib  looked  round  over  the  Lady 
Savylle's  head  that  was  still  upon  his  shoulder. 
"Oh,  go  away  for  a  silly  old  goat,"  he  said. 
"Didn't  you  hear  me  tell  the  fellow  that  his  sen- 
tence is  to  be  revised?"  f 

"Yes,"  Sir  Arthur  answered,  with  a  splendid 
unconcern.  "I  told  them  they  must  give  him 
another  year,  and  they  will." 

"Well,  you  run  away  and  see,"  Mr.  Broadrib 
said.  I 

Sir  Arthur  looked  him  hard  in  the  eyes. 

"You  mean,"  he  gasped,  "that  you  have  been 
meddling!  Infamous!"  He  rushed  from  the 
room  and  they  heard  him  exclaiming  "Infa- 
mous!" all  down  the  stairs. 


IV, 

THE  major  was  taken  back  to  Basildon, 
wrapped  up  like  a  bale  of  merchandise,  in 
the  motor;  and  it  fell  to  Miss  Peabody  to  be 
driven  by  the  major's  uncle  in  the  dog-cart. 
For  Miss  Peabody  had  been  deeply  offended  by 
Mrs.  Foster  in  the  well  of  the  court.  Mrs. 
Foster  had  wept  over  the  condition  of  Miss 
Delamare  when  she  fainted,  and  this  had  ap- 
peared to  Miss  Peabody  to  be  excessive.  She 
had  said  that  she  was  the  person  to  be  con- 
sidered, as  it  was  her  fiance  who  was  to  be  sent 
to  prison,  not  Miss  Delamare's.  And  Mrs. 
Foster  had  snapped  out  that  she  loved  little 
Flossie's  little  finger  better  than  the  whole  of 
Miss  Peabody's  body,  and  so  did  the  major,  and 
so  did  everybody  with  eyes  in  their  heads.  The 
words  were  unconsidered  and  spoken  in  emo- 
tion, but  Miss  Peabody  treasured  them  up. 

The  trial  had  been  resumed  and  concluded 
with  an  air  of  extraordinary  solemnity.  The 
three  justices  upon  the  bench  looked  more  tired 
and  more  tempestuous  than  ever;  but  they  had 
received  a  telegram  addressed  to  Mr.  Broadrib 

231 


232  RING  FOR  NANCY 

and  communicated  to  them  which  was  couched 
in  extraordinarily  vigorous  terms  from  the 
home  secretary.  And  they  reaHzed  that  the 
eyes  of  two  great  parties  would  certainly  be 
upon  them.  They  were  going  to  act  with  the 
dignity  that  their  country  and  the  civilized 
world  expected  from  them.  Twenty  minutes 
before  they  had  been-  in  a  very  different  case; 
they  had  been  presiding  in  an  obscure  court  over 
an  obscure  allegation  against  an  obscure  mem- 
ber of  the  wealthy  classes. 

The  moment  the  major  was  again  in  the  dock, 
Mr.  Justice  Hills,  who  had  by  now  remembered 
that  he  was  a  judge  of  the  King's  Bench,  re- 
marked peremptorily: 

"Have  you  anything  to  say  why  sentence 
should  not  be  pronounced  on  you?" 

The  major  remarked:  "I  thought  you  had 
pronounced  sentence;  I  don't  care  tuppence. 
You  obviously  can't  do  anything  so  ridiculous 
as  to  sentence  me  to  six  months'  imprison- 
ment for  offenses  that  I  never  committed." 

Mr.  Justice  Hills  appeared  to  be  paying  him 
no  attention.  "The  offenses  that  you  have  com- 
mitted," he  said,  "are  very  serious,  and  we 
might  take  into  consideration  also  your  disre- 
spectful conduct  to  the  court  in  leaving  the 
dock  before  the  end  of  the  trial.     But  taking 


RING  FOR  NANCY  233 

into  consideration  the  fact  that  a  female  con- 
nection of  yours  had  become  indisposed,  and 
that  you  were  only  acting  in  the  interests  of 
common  humanity  in  desiring  to  fetch  restora- 
tives for  the  lady  .  .  ." 

"But  I  wasn't  doing  anything  of  the  sort," 
the  major  said. 

".  .  .  taking  into  consideration  the  fact  that 
you  appeared"  the  judge  said  significantly,  "to 
be  going  to  fetch  restoratives  for  the  lady,  we 
shall  pass  over  that  portion  of  your  conduct. 
The  sentence  that  we  have  already  pronounced 
upon  you  was  merely  by  way  of  showing  you 
what  are  our  powers.  It  should  serve  as  an 
excellent  warning  to  all  evil-doers  who  may 
be  tempted  to  act  in  the  future  as  you  have 
done  in  the  past." 

"But  bless  my  soul,"  the  major  said,  "I 
didn't  do  anything  at  all." 

"But  taking  into  consideration  your  youth 
and  inexperience,"  the  judge  said,  "and  consid- 
ering also  that  a  distinguished  ornament  of  this 
bench" — here  Mr.  Justice  Hills  bowed  in  the 
direction  of  Mr.  Broadrib — "has  seen  fit  to  in- 
tercede for  you,  and  to  explain  that  you  have 
suffered  what  it  is  customary  to  call  *consider- 
able  hardship'  in  the  service  of  your  country, 
we  are  ready  to  use  the  powers  of  reconsidera- 


234  RING  FOR  NANCY 

tion  that  the  law  has  given  into  our  hands,  and 
to  apply  to  you  the  First  Offenders'  Act.  You 
are  discharged." 

"Well,"  the  major  said,  "I  guess  the  First 
Offenders'  Act  was  never  more  fittingly  applied. 
For  wasn't  it  the  first  offense  of  the  sort  that 
was  ever  tried? — to  offer  an  old  gentleman  a 
corner  seat  in  one's  reserved  carriage — for  that's 
the  only  offense  that  has  been  proved  against 
me."  Then  he  stepped  down  out  of  the  dock 
and  gave  the  blushing  policeman  half  a  sov- 
ereign. He  felt  that  it  was  the  least  he  could  do 
under  the  circumstances. 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  tension  in  the 
Manor  House  that  night,  for  during  her  drive 
in  the  dog-cart,  Miss  Peabody,  who  was  not  in 
the  least  satisfied  with  the  course  the  trial  had 
taken,  took  occasion  to  insist  that  Mr.  Arthur 
Foster  should  refuse  absolutely  to  sign  the  con- 
tract for  the  new  theater.  She  took  occasion 
also  to  say  many  things  that  completely  de- 
stroyed the  character  of  Miss  Delamare.  For 
what  had  most  irritated  her  in  the  things  of  the 
trial  had  been  the  fact  that  Miss  Delamare  had 
fainted  and  not  she  herself.  This  appeared  to 
her  to  be  the  most  disgraceful  episode  in  the 
disgraceful  career  of  that  actress,  for  she  con- 
sidered  that   the   fainting  fit   was   an   absolute 


RING  FOR  NANCY  235 

proof  of  what  she  called  "guilty  relations"  be- 
tween Miss  Delamare  and  the  major.  So  that, 
when  he  got  down  from  the  dog-cart,  Mr.  Arthur 
Foster  went  straight  to  his  wife's  room  and  an- 
nounced that  he  was  determined  to  refuse  Miss 
Delamare  the  leading  part  in  the  new  theater. 

To  his  intense  relief  his  wife  said  not  a  single 
word  beyond  the  one  phrase:  "Then  I  advise 
you  not  to  say  a  word  of  it  to  Miss  Delamare." 
But  there  was  a  sort  of  steely  enigmatic  man- 
ner about  the  lady  that  seriously  alarmed  Mr. 
Foster.  He  attempted  to  explain  the  motives 
of  his  resolve,  but  Mrs.  Foster  only  answered: 
"It's  your  own  money,  I  suppose.  You  can  do 
what  you  like  with  it.  You  had  better  go  away 
now;  I  want  to  give  orders  about  Edward's 
dinner.  He  won't  come  down  this  evening;  he 
is  not  well.  I  shan't  either;  I'm  not  well,  and 
Flossie  will  dine  with  me.     She's  not  well." 

And  the  moment  Mr.  Foster  was  gone  Mrs. 
Foster  rang  the  bell  and  told  her  maid  to  tell 
her  ladyship's  own  maid  that  if  Miss  Jenkins 
was  at  liberty,  she  would  come  and  see  Miss 
Jenkins  in  the  housekeeper's  room.  And  she 
followed  so  hard  on  the  heels  of  her  own  maid, 
that  she  was  in  Miss  Jenkins'  room  before  the 
servant  had  got  the  words  out  of  her  mouth. 
She  said,  with  the  remains  of  the  dignity  that 
she  had  been  bestowing  upon  her  husband: 


236  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"I'll  trouble  you,  Miss  Jenkins,  to  arrange 
that  I  have  another  room,  and  that  my  things 
are  removed  from  mine  to-morrow  morning." 
And  then,  the  servant  being  gone  from  the 
room,  she  said:  "I  really  can't  help  it.  Miss  Jen- 
kins; either  that  v^onian  goes,  or  I  do."  And 
she  burst  into  a  flood  of  tears. 

Miss  Jenkins  settled  her  dov^n  into  her  arm- 
chair before  the  fire.  She  produced  a  small 
green  phial  that  contained  sedative  drops;  she 
dropped  six  of  these  on  to  a  lump  of  sugar  and 
she  put  the  lump  of  sugar  in  Mrs.  Foster's 
mouth. 

"You  will  feel  better  in  three  minutes,"  she 
said;  "and  during  those  three  minutes  you  had 
better  just  cry,  ma'am." 

The  room  was  small  and  square  and  comfort- 
able, and  Mrs.  Foster  cried  on,  letting  her  tears 
fall  on  the  fender.  Miss  Jenkins  stood  calm 
and  erect  on  the  other  side  of  the  table  that 
had  a  red  baize  covering.  She  looked  down  at 
her  fingers  and  reflected. 

"Of  course,  ma'am,"  she  said  at  last,  "if  you 
really  wanted  Miss  Peabody  ejected  from  this 
household,  I  can  do  it  for  you!" 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  up  from  the  fireplace. 

"If  I  want  it!"  she  exclaimed.  "I  want 
nothing  else;  nothing  else  in  the  world.     That 


RING  FOR  NANCY  237 

woman  is  the  ruin  of  all  our  lives,  and  if  I  spoke 
discourteously  to  her  in  the  court,  which  I 
couldn't  help,  being  carried  out  of  myself  by 
anxiety  for  Flossie — for  I  said  to  her,  meaning 
Miss  Peabody,  that  I  loved  Miss  Delamare's 
little  finger  better  than  the  whole  of  Miss  Pea- 
body's  body — though  it  would  be  more  proper 
to  say  that  I  hate  the  whole  of  Miss  Peabody's 
body  and  soul  and  mind  and  machinations,  for 
she's  plotting  and  plotting  and  plotting — and  so 
did  the  major  love  Flossie  better,  though  I'm 
not  saying  that  he's  in  love  with  her,  and  so 
would  anybody  who  had  a  feeling  heart  in  his 
or   her   breast. 

"And  now  she's  plotted  and  plotted  until  she's 
got  Mr.  Foster  to  desert  Flossie  Delamare — 
and  I'm  sure  if  I  wasn't  afraid  the  major 
would  need  my  money,  I'd  set  Miss  Dela- 
mare up  in  a  theater  myself.  And  I'm  sure 
of  this,  too,  that  unless  Mr.  Foster  changes 
his  mind  in  the  night  without  any  words  spoken 
by  me,  I  will  never  sleep  in  the  same  room  with 
him  again,  for  he's  so  weak  and  so  easily  influ- 
enced, that  I'm  tired  of  him  and  done  with  him; 
^and  that's  the  last  word  I  mean  to  say  about 
this  for  fear  of  boring  you.  Miss  Jenkins;  but 
this  isn't  the  last  word  I'm  going  to  think,  and 
the  thoughts  come  bubbling  up  in  me  like  the 


238  RING  FOR  NANCY 

water  of  a  plum-pudding  that  I  used  to  watcH 
boiling  when  I  was  in  my  father's  house.  For 
the  admiral  he  was  a  man,  though  a  rampant 
roaring  man  and  the  major  is  my  own  boy,  and 
I'd  go  to  the  bad  for  him;  but  as  for  Mr.  Fos- 
ter .  .  ." — Mrs.  Foster  suddenly  closed  her  lips 
tight — "well,  I  can't  think  of  what  to  say  about 
Mr.  Foster,  and  it  wouldn't  beseem  me  to  say 
it  if  I  could  think  of  it." 

Miss  Jenkins  remained  reflecting  for  quite  a 
long  time.    At  last  she  said: 

"Of  course,  I'm  willing  to  attempt  to  eject 
the  lady;  and  if  you  give  me  a  free  hand  I'm 
perfectly  willing  to  try  to  do  it,  and  do  it  I  think 
I  can.  I  should  prefer  it  just  to  come  about, 
for,  if  there's  any  kind  of  decency  in  things,  it 
would  come  about.  But  there  doesn't  seem  to 
be — any  kind  of  decency  in  things.  I  should 
have  thought  that  when  those  charges  were 
made  against  the  major  Miss  Peabody,  consid- 
ering her  nature,  would  have  thrown  the  major 
over.  But  that  doesn't  seem  to  be  her  nature. 
On  the  contrary,  it's  acted  in  the  other  way. 
So  that  if  you  ask  me,  I  will  do  what  I  can, 
though  it  appears  to  me  to  be  a  discreditable 
action,  and  that's  all  there  is  to  it." 

Mrs.  Foster  suddenly  stood  up.  "A  discredit- 
able action?"  she  asked.    "Did  you  ever  hear  of 


RING  FOR  NANCY  239 

Saint  George? — the  gentleman  who  rescued  a 
naked  princess  from  a  dragon.  And  did  you 
ever  hear  that  that  was  a  discreditable  action? — 
though  I  can't  say  that  the  major  is  anything 
like  a  naked  princess,  and  neither  am  I  for  the 
matter  of  that.  But  if  you  could  rescue  us  from 
this  dragon — two  of  us  .  .  ."  and  Mrs.  Foster 
broke  off,  to  begin  again  with  extraordinary 
vigor:  ''Discreditable!  why  she's  the  ruin  .  .  . 
why  she's  the  end  .  .  ."  and  Mrs.  Foster  broke 
off  again  and  remarked:  "But  I'm  boring  you." 

Miss  Jenkins  still  remained  standing  perfectly 

ill,  looking  downward  and  reflecting. 

"It   seems  to  me,   ma'am,"   she   said  at  last, 

'that   if  you   are   going  to   separate   from   Mr. 

'oster,   it   would   be   more   proper   and   seemly 

|lhat  he  should  be  moved  away  from  your  room 

|than  you.    And  if  you  agree  to  that,  that's  what 

I'll  do  to-morrow  morning." 

"I  dare  say  you're  right.  Miss  Jenkins,"  Mrs. 
Foster  said.  "You  put  us  all  right  in  every- 
thing. But  that's  not  the  important  point.  The 
important  point  is,  what  are  you  going  to  do 
about   the    other   thing?" 

"I  don't  think  I  can  tell  you  about  that, 
ma'am,"   Miss  Jenkins   answered. 


PART  III 


TiyrR.  ARTHUR  FOSTER  had  a  thoroughly^ 
^^^  uncomfortable  dinner  with  Miss  Peabod}^ 
and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  Miss  Peabody  was  ex- 
ceedingly nervous;  Mr.  Foster  was  thoroughly 
fidgety;  and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  talked  inces- 
santly, and  with  a  hard  insistence,  about  the 
reform  of  conventional  marriage  and  her  new 
play,  which  she  had  almost  persuaded  Miss 
Delamare  to  promise  to  stage  at  the  reformed 
theater.  This  made  Mr.  Foster  extremely  un- 
comfortable, for  he  could  not  help  remembering 
at  every  word  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  that  he 
had  promised  to  suppress  the  reformed  theater. 
Miss  Peabody,  on  the  other  hand,  was  pleased. 
She  thought  it  really  splendid  that  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  should  prove  by  her  conversation,  which 
could  only  be  regarded  as  immoral  in  the  ex- 
treme, that  a  reformed  theater  conducted  by  a 
person  like  Miss  Flossie  Delamare  would  be  an 
exceedingly  undesirable  thing,  not  only  for  the 
morals  of  the  country,  but  also  for  Mr.  Foster^s 
own  social  advancement. 

She  wanted,  indeed,   to  explain  this   to  Mr. 
243 


244  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Foster  after  dinner.  She  meant  to  tell  him  that 
merely  turning  out  Miss  Delamare  need  not 
necessarily  suppress  the  theater  altogether.  She 
herself,  she  wanted  to  say,  was  perfectly  ready 
and  able  to  run  the  theater.  Of  course,  she  was 
not  capable  of  acting  herself,  but  with  the  lit- 
erary education  that  she  had  received  in  Bos- 
ton, which  is  the  acknowledged  metropolis  of 
learning  for  the  world,  she  would  be  perfectly 
able  to  select  the  plays  which  were  to  be  pro- 
duced, and  to  engage  actresses  of  serious  and 
not  merely  frivolous  gifts.  She  was  anxious, 
moreover,  to  insist  that  Mr.  Foster  should  en- 
force his  authority  and  have  Miss  Delamare 
ejected  from  the  house  next  day.  She  wanted 
to  say  that  Flossie  was  leading  the  major 
astray.  She  was  absolutely  certain  of  this.  She 
thought  she  had  surprised  glances  between  the 
major   and    Miss    Delamare    in    the    court. 

But  she  did  not  get  any  conversation  with 
Mr.  Foster.  He  was  fidgetingly  anxious  for 
some  conversation  with  his  wife,  and  when  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  said  that  she  was  going  to  get  her 
play  and  read  them  the  second  act,  he  took  the 
opportunity  of  going  up-stairs  to  his  wife's  bed- 
room. Miss  Peabody,  also,  went  to  her  own 
room;  so  that  when  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  returned 
to  the  drawing-room  she  found  no  audience  at 


RING  FOR  NANCY  245 

all  for  her  play,  and  she  spent  the  rest  of  the 
evening  playing  the  music  of  Pigs  is  Pigs  in 
solitude  among  ghostly  men  in  armor. 

Mr.  Foster  did  not  find  his  wife  in  her  bed- 
room. And  when  he  asked  her  maid,  he  was 
told  that  Mrs.  Foster  was  with  the  major.  He 
went  there  himself,  and  there  he  found  the 
major  in  his  dressing-gown  lying  in  the  long 
armchair  before  the  fire.  He  had  a  green 
shade  over  his  eyes,  and  Mrs.  Foster  and  Miss 
Delamare  were  also  there.  Mrs.  Foster  was 
knitting  Berlin  wool;  Miss  Delamare  was  mak- 
ing up  a  ball  from  a  skein  that  the  major  held 
over  his  two  hands,  and  they  were  all  laughing 
at  the  tops  of  their  voices,  because  Miss  Dela- 
mare was  giving  them  an  exact  imitation  of  the 
mannerisms  of  all  the  three  justices,  of  the 
policemen,  of  Mr.  Broadrib  and  Sir  Arthur 
Johnson.  Just  as  Mr.  Foster  came  into  the 
room,  she  was  erecting  her  head,  frowning  tre- 
mendously    and    exclaiming:    "Infamous!" 

The  pleasant  family  tone  of  the  room  affected 
Mr.  Foster  with  a  sort  of  homesickness.  He 
asked  to  be  permitted  to  sit  down,  and  no  one 
forbade  it.  And  then  he  informed  his  nephew 
that  he  intended  to  write  to  The  Times  to  de- 
nounce the  Lord  Chancellor's  new  experiments 
in  justices  of  the  peace.     The  major  thanked 


246  RING  FOR  NANCY 

his  uncle,  and  begged  him  not  to  take  so  much 
trouble;  but  Mr.  Foster  said  it  was  his  duty  as 
the  sturdy  Nonconformist  Unionist  that  he  was. 
Mrs.  Foster  just  sat  and  knitted,  but  there  was 
in  her  eyes  an  expression  so  nearly  resembling 
the  steely  and  the  ironical,  that  Mr.  Foster's 
nervousness  increased.  And  then  once  again, 
Flossie,  who  was  the  most  good-natured  little 
soul  alive,  and  who  perceived  that  there  was  in 
the  air  a  decided  strain,  began  a  new  series  of 
imitations  of  the  trial.  But  Mr.  Foster  observed 
that,  although  his  wife  laughed  till  the  tears 
c^me  when  Miss  Delamare  said:  "Have  you 
anything  to  say  why  sentence  should  not  be 
passed  upon  you?"  Mrs.  Foster  became  steely 
and  cold  in  expression  whenever  he  raised  his 
own  voice.  And  after  an  hour  and  a  half  of  it 
he  really  could  not  stand  it  any  longer.  He 
said:  ^ 

"My  dear,  I  should  be  really  glad  of  a  word 
with  you." 

Mrs.  Foster  rose  in  an  extraordinarily  stiff 
manner  and  followed  him  out  of  the  room.  He 
led  her  into  the  next  bedroom,  turned  up  the 
light  and  closed  the  door. 

"My  dear,"  he  began  at  once  in  a  hurried  and 
flustered  voice,  "I  want  you  to  understand  that 
I  am  perfectly  reasonable  in  the  step  I  propose 


RING  FOR  NANCY  247 

to  take.  Putting  aside  the  facts  of  Flossie's 
past  history,  I  have  just  been  listening  to  the 
plot  of  a  play  by  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  .  .  ." 

Mrs.  Foster  interrupted  him  suddenly  and 
disconcertingly:  "If  you  can  find  it  in  your 
heart  to  say  anything  against  that  little  creature 
who's   sitting  in   there   with   my   Edward  .  .  ." 

"I  wasn't  saying  anything  at  all  against  her," 
Mr.  Foster  exclaimed:  *'but  this  play  of  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe's  that  she  has  promised  to  put 
on  .  .  ." 

"She  hasn't  promised  to  put  on  any  play  by 
Airs.  Kerr  Howe  at  all,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "She 
hasn't  promised,  and  she  isn't  going  to." 

"But  it's  a  terrible  play,"  Mr.  Foster  re- 
marked. 

"It's  no  good  talking,  Arthur,"  his  wife 
answered,  "and  I'm  not  going  to  talk:.  If  your 
own  heart  doesn't  tell  you  what's  right  and 
proper,  you're  not  the  man  I  took  you  for,  and 
there's  an  end  of  it.  I  won't  hear  another 
word." 

"But  consider  the  whole  of  the  circum- 
stances," Mr.  Foster  said.  "Consider  that  we 
could  not  possibly  have  Miss  Delamare  in  the 
house  when  Edward  is  married  to  Olympia. 
Consider  all  the  trouble  it  would  make.  Con- 
sider the  scandal  it  would  cause  if  Olympia  ob- 


248  RING  FOR  NANCY 

jected.  Surely,  surely,  we've  got  to  consider 
that  splendid  and  gifted  woman  before  the  pri- 
vate wishes  of  any  other  member  of  the  house- 
hold. You  haven't  got  anything  to  say  against 
that,  have  you?"  He  paused  for  some  reply 
from   his  wife,  but   there  came   none. 

There  was  beginning  a  babble  of  voices  from 
the  corridor. 

"That  appears  to  me  to  be  the  first  thing  to  be 
considered,"  Mr.  Foster  repeated.  "Surely  you 
will  not  deny  that!" 

"That  first  thing  that  seems  to  me  to  be  con- 
sidered," Mrs.  Foster  said  maliciously,  "is  that, 
by  your  silliness,  Flossie  and  Edward  have  been 
left  alone  in  his  bedroom,  and  that  your  fine 
madam  has  discovered  them  there.  You  can 
hear  her  pretty  voice  .  .  ." 

And  there  was  no  mistaking  the  fact  that  the 
raised  tones  of  Miss  Peabody  were  coming  from 
somewhere  at  no  great  distance. 

They  went  side  by  side  into  the  next  room. 

"This  is  the  end,"  Miss  Peabody  was  exclaim- 
ing tragically,  in  the  closing  words  of  a  long 
invocation. 

She  turned  upon  Mr.  Foster. 

"Here,"  she  exclaimed,  "you  have  ocular 
proof  of  the  abandoned  nature  of  this  young 
person.     Is  it  conceivable  that  any  other  mem- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  249 

ber  of  her  sex  would  be  found  in  these  circum- 
stances?" There  was  such  fire  in  her  voice  and 
gestures  that  Mr.  Foster  was  really  sHghtly 
alarmed. 

''God  bless  my  soul!"  he  exclaimed.  "Not 
in  each  other's  arms!" 

"And  why  shouldn't  they  be?"  Mrs.  Foster 
asked,  with  an  alarming  sharpness.  It  was  so 
alarming  that  Mr.  Foster  blurted  out: 

"Of  course,  it  would  not  be  a  proof  of  guil — 
of  guilty  .  .  ." 

And  then  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed,  "Silence!" 
with  such  vigor  that  they  were  all  quiet.  "They 
were  not  in  each  other's  arms,"  she  continued. 
"Why  should  they  be?  I  am  not  complaining 
of  Edward.  I  trust  him  implicity.  But  it  is 
this  abandoned  and  shameless  woman  whom  I 
find  here  that  I  denounce.  I  accuse  her  of 
creeping  after  my  fiance  on  every  occasion; 
of  using  devices  to  attract  his  affection.  I 
accuse  her  .  .  ." 

"Really,  Olympia,"  the  major  began,  but  she 
took  no  notice;  and  for  a  minute  they  were 
talking  together.  Miss  Peabody's  voice  came 
out  triumphant. 

"A  woman  who  is  capable  of  putting  herself 
into  such  a  situation  .  .  ." 

"Of  course,  my  dear  lady,"  Mr,  Foster  said. 


250  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"it  is  very  shocking.  But  still  there  are  .  .  . 
there  are  extenuating  circumstances  .  .  ." 

Miss  Peabody  said,  "What  are  they?"  with 
such  violence  that  Mr.  Foster  forgot  completely 
all  that  he  had  meant  to  say.  And  she  con- 
tinued triumphantly:  "A  woman  who  will  come 
to  a  man's   rooms  .  .  ." 

And  then  Miss  Delamare  stood  up. 

"Don't  you  forget,"  she  remarked  good- 
humoredly,  "that  I  am  not  the  only  pebble  on 
the  beach.  You're  making  such  a  ridiculous  ex- 
hibition of  yourself,  that  you  do  not  deserve 
any  sympathy;  but  still — ^just  remember  that 
for  a  minute." 

Miss  Peabody  exclaimed,  "Mr.  Foster!"  in 
tones  so  tragic  that  Mr.  Foster  started  toward 
her  side. 

"Now  we've  had  enough  of  this,"  Mrs.  Foster 
remarked,  and  at  the  same  moment  Miss  Pea- 
body said: 

"We've  had  more  than  enough  of  this,"  and 
she  looked  fixedly  at  Mr.  Foster  to  remark: 
"Either  Miss  Delamare  leaves  this  house,  or 
I  do." 

And  like  an  echo  Mrs.  Foster  said:  "Either 
Miss  Delamare  stays  here,  or  I  go." 

Miss  Peabody  really  started. 

"Either  Miss  Delamare  stays  in  this  house," 


RING  FOR  NANCY  251 

Mrs.    Foster   repeated   categorically,   "or   I    go 
out  of  it,     I  hope  you  understand  me." 

Mr.  Foster  stuttered:  "What?  What?  W^hat?" 
"Yes,  what,  what,  what,"  Mrs.  Foster  said 
hysterically.  "For  a  long  time  Miss  Delamare 
has  been  more  than  a  daughter  to  me.  I've 
never  known  what  it  was  to  have  a  child,  or  any 
comfort;  and  now  I  know  it,  and  I'm  not  going 
to  give  it  up.  I've  had  the  dear  and  precious 
luxury  of  having  my  Edward,  but  that's  going 
to  be  only  for  a  week  or  two.  He's  going  to  be 
taken  from  me  by  a  woman  whom  I  can  never 
like.  And  I  am  not  going  back  to  my  loneliness 
again.  So  that  it's  come  to  this  .  .  ."  And 
Mrs.  Foster  looked  round  her  with  an  expres- 
sion of  courageous  terror.  "Now  here,  with  all 
of  you  to  witness,  I  adopt  Miss  Delamare  for 
my  own  child.  So  long  as  she  stays  where  I 
am  she  is  my  own  dear  daughter.  And  if  she  is 
driven  out  of  it  I  go  with  her.  And  I  will  be 
her  chaperon  and  wait  for  l;er  outside  the 
theater,  or  whatever  it  is  her  paid  chaperon 
does,  if  she'll  have  me,  until  world  without 
end." 

For  a  moment  Miss  Peabody  gazed  round  her 
in  what  might  have  been  called  a  baleful  man- 
ner. Then  she  swallowed  a  disagreeable  lump 
in  her  throat.     She  had  got  hold  of  the  situa- 


252  RING  FOR  NANCY 

tion  so  thoroughly  that,  although  this  announce- 
ment entirely  changed  the  situation,  it  did  not 
take  her  more  time  than  that  moment  of  swal- 
lowing to  know  pretty  well  where  she  stood. 
She  knew,  for  instance,  that  although  she  had 
Mr.  Foster  very  much  under  her  thumb,  she  had 
not  got  him  sufficiently  there  to  make  him  con- 
template with  equanimity  the  prospect  of  a 
definite  breach  with  Mrs.  Foster.  She  could 
See  that  that  elderly  gentleman  was  exceedingly 
"on  the  jump,"  as  nervous  as  a  man  well  could 
be;  and  she  knew  that  she  would  have  to  do 
something  to  calm  matters  down.  She  was  still 
determined  to  eject  Miss  Delamare  from  the  re- 
formed theater  scheme,  and  she  thought  she 
could  always  influence  Mr.  Foster  sufficiently 
for  that  by  just  forcing  it  perpetually  on  his 
attention  that  no  one  would  take  Miss  Delamare 
seriously  enough,  if  she  were  left  as  the  acting 
manageress  of  the  theater — aeriously  enough  to 
make  the  theater  any  good  for  Mr.  Foster's 
social  advancement. 

She  knew  that  there  she  was  on  pretty  safe 
ground,  whereas  when  it  came  to  attacking 
Miss  Delamare's  moral  character,  although 
she  was  perfectly  certain  that  Miss  Delamare 
was  an  infamous  woman,  she  realized  that 
she   had   not   got   anything   to   go   upon.      She 


1^ 


RING  FOR  NANCY  253 

had  never  heard  a  single  word  against  Flossie. 
But  Flossie  could  not  be  taken  very  seriously, 
and  a  theater  that  Flossie  ran  certainly  could 
not  be  taken  seriously  enough  to  get  Mr.  Fos- 
ter a  knighthood  as  a  national  benefactor. 
She  remained  perfectly  determined  to  oust 
Flossie  Delamare  from  that  family;  but  she 
saw  that  she  had  been  too  precipitate.  She 
would  just  have  to  wait  till  she  was  safely  mar- 
ried to  the  major.  She  had  time  enough  in 
that  one  action  of  swallowing  to  feel  what  you 
might  call  all  the  elements  in  that  situation, 
although  she  certainly  did  not  have  time  to  put 
them  into  thoughts.    And  she  just  said: 

"Of  course,  that  entirely  alters  matters  alto- 
gether.    Of  course,  if  Mrs.  Foster  has  adopted 
Miss  Delamare,  it  makes  Miss  Delamare  in  a 
sort  of  a  way  almost  Edward's  sister.     So  that 
I  can  see  that  various  little  tokens  of  affection 
from  Flossie — if  I  might  call  her  Flossie  .  .  ." 
"I  think  you  had  better  call  me   Florence," 
iss  Delamare  said.     "That's  my  name." 
".  .  .  any    little    evidences    of    affection    that 
Florence    may    have    shown    Edward    are,    of 
course,  upon  an  entirely  different  basis." 
"Of  course,  of  course,"  Mr.  Foster  said. 
"And    that    being    so,"    Miss    Peabody    con- 
tinued, "there  doesn't  seem  to  me  to  be  any- 


254  •        RING  FOR  NANCY 

thing  left  for  me  but  to  congratulate  Florence 
on  the  news  that  I  have  just  heard,  and  to  hope 
that  everything  will  be  very  pleasant  in  the 
future." 

"So  that  that's  all  right,  that's  all  right,"  Mr. 
Foster  remarked. 

"Things  have  got  to  be  much  more  pleasant 
in  the  future,"  Mrs.  Foster  said  hardly. 
"They've  just  got  to  be.  I'm  not  going  to  have 
my  Edward  worried  any  more.  I  don't  like  to 
see  him  sitting  about  here  with  a  green  shade 
over  his  eyes.  I'm  going  to  take  him  up  to 
town  to-morrow  in  the  motor,  myself,  to  see  a 
specialist.  I  want  to  hear  what's  said,  and 
what's  to  be  done  for  him.  I  know  that  excite- 
ment and  trouble  and  all  these  things  are  bad 
for  his  eyes,  and  there's  an  end  of  it." 

For  a  moment  Miss  Peabody  thought  of  say- 
ing that,  in  that  case,  she  ought  to  be  allowed 
to  be  of  the  party;  but  she  suddenly  remem- 
bered that  that  would  leave  Mr.  Foster  open  to 
the  advances  of  Miss  Delamare,  and  she  said 
instead:  "That  would  be  an  immense  relief  to 
my  mind." 

"Well,"  the  major  remarked  from  under  his 
green  shade,  "you  have  had  the  most  terrific  and 
edifying  scrap  over  my  poor  body,  and  I  hope 
you  are  admiring  the  pretty  way  in  which  I  laid 


¥ 


RING  FOR  NANCY  255 

still  and  didn't  poke  my  nose  into  it.  And  now 
that  it's  all  settled — and  it's  thankful  I  am  that 
it's  all  settled  without  my  having  to  make  any 
exertions — for  usually  it's  me  who  has  to  take 
command  of  all  these  situations  ..." 

"Oh,  but,  Teddy,"  Miss  Delamare  suddenly 
interrupted  him,  "it  isn't  all  settled;  it  isn't 
really  quite  altogether  settled.  I  guess  I  want 
an  apology — an  exact,  and  what  you  would  call 
a  specific,  apology  from  Miss  Peabody." 

Olympia  exclaimed:  "But  good  gracious,  I've 
apologized  and  withdrawn  everything." 

"Oh,  it  isn't  for  me,"  Flossie  said  amiably.  "I 
have  a  public  character,  and  I  guess  I  can  stand 
all  the  shot  that's  ever  shot  against  me  without 
the  hair  of  one  of  my  wigs,  whether  it's  auburn 
or  black,  standing  up  on  end.  No,  it  isn't  for 
me  I  want  the  apology,  but  it's  for  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter." 

"But,"  Mr.  Foster  exclaimed,  "nobody  has 
insulted  Mrs.  Foster." 

"Well,  if  you  can't  see  it,"  Miss  Delamare 
said,  "I  can.  Miss  Peabody  has  accused  Mrs. 
Foster  of  throwing  in  the  major's  way  the  sort 
of  woman — well,  the  sort  of  woman  that  you 
couldn't  leave  alone  with  him  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  come,  Flossie,  dear,"  the  major  said; 
"there's  quite  enough  of  all  this." 


256  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"No,  there  isn't,"  Miss  Delamare  answered. 
"If  Mrs.  Foster's  going  to  be  my  mother,  I'm 
going  to  stand  up  for  my  mother,  and  things 
have  got  to  be  perfectly  good  and  straight." 

Miss  Peabody  had  started  with  rage  when 
she  heard  the  major  say  "Flossie,  dear."  She 
had  sufficient  sense  to  see  that  she  was  up 
against  it — right  absolutely  up  against  it.  She 
would  have  to  apologize  to  Mrs.  Foster  at  the 
demand  of  Flossie  Delamare,  and  that  was  the 
bitterest  proposition  that  had  ever  been  put  to 
her  in  her  life.  In  some  odd  way  it  increased 
her  hatred  for  Miss  Delamare  a  thousandfold. 
She  felt  almost  that,  supposing  a  knife  had  been 
handy,  she  could  have  plunged  it  into  Miss  Dela- 
mare's  throat. 

But  when  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed,  "I  certainly 
think  that  some  sort  of  apology  ought  to  be 
made  to  me,"  Miss  Peabody  said  from  a  dry 
throat: 

"Of  course,  I  had  no  idea  of  insulting  any- 
body; and  it  stands  to  reason  that  if  I  have  done 
so  I  take  it  all  back.  I  simply  did  not  know 
what  the  circumstances  were." 

"Well,  then,  that's  handsome,"  Miss  Dela- 
mare said;  "and  just  to  let  you  know  exactly 
what  the  circumstances  are — and  I'm  sure  it 
ought  to  put  your  troubled  mind  at  rest — I  will 


RING  FOR  NANCY  257 

just  tell  you  that  I  love  Teddy  here  just  as 
much  as  it's  possible  to  love  anybody  in  the 
world.  And  how  couldn't  I!  For  when  I  come 
to  think  of  what  I  might  have  been,  if  it  had 
not  been  for  Teddy  picking  me  up  and  putting 
me  on  my  feet  at  a  time  when,  as  he  says,  I  was 
a  half-starved  little  rat — I  just  shudder  to  think 
about  it.  So  I  just  love  Teddy  w^ith  the  deepest 
gratitude  you  could  possibly  get  out  of  a  half- 
starved  rat;  but  if  you  think,  Olympia,  that  I'd 
go  poaching  on  your,  or  any  other  woman's, 
preserves — why,  you're  a  much  sillier  fool  than 
I  ever  took  you  for,  and  you  appear  to  me  to 
be  pretty  foolish  at  times.'* 

"Oh,  I  quite  believe  you,"  Miss  Peabody  said. 
And  the  odd  thing  was,  that  she  did  perfectly 
believe  Miss  Delamare  and  that  she  hated  her — 
in  spite  of  that  belief — so  that  she  really  felt 
that  she  was  going  to  faint.  She  said  to  Mr. 
Foster:  "If  you  will  just  give  me  that  paper  of 
statistics — the  blue  one,  A32 — I  shall  go  to  my 
room  and  study  them." 

With  a  frightened  glance  at  his  wife — a  sort 
of  agonized  appeal  to  her — Mr.  Foster  went  out 
of  the  room.    This  did  not  please  Mrs.  Foster. 


II 

T^ISS  PEABODY  managed  to  fix  up  her 
^^^  own  particular  side  of  the  matter  pretty 
well  before  the  unfortunate  Mr.  Foster  got 
to  bed  that  night.  She  really  had  begun  to 
make  him  see  that  Miss  Delamare  was  not  the 
person  to  run  a  serious  theater.  She  had  the 
sense  to  repeat  in  private  what  she  had  said,  as 
it  were,  in  public,  before  the  others.  She  with- 
drew in  the  frankest  and  most  unlimited  way 
anything  that  she  had  ever  said  against  Flossie's 
moral  character.  But  she  pointed  out  with 
great  insistence  that  a  lady  whose  highest  idea 
of  praise  was  to  be  called  the  "symphonic  em- 
bodiment of  quaint  imbecility"  was  not  obvious- 
ly the  person  to  manage  a  theater  that  should 
stand  for  great  and  serious  moral  truths.  Mr. 
Foster  took  his  stand  upon  the  words  "sym- 
phonic embodiment."  These  seemed  to  him  to 
be  words  matchless  and  remarkable.  He  did 
not  exactly  know  what  they  meant,  but  they 
appeared  to  him  to  be  very  strengthening.  But 
Miss  Peabody  hammered  in  the  other  two  words 
"quaint  imbecility."     She  said  that  there  could 

258 


RING  FOR  NANCY  259 

not  possibly  be  any  mistake  as  to  what  those 
words  meant,  and  they  certainly  did  not  mean 
anything  that  had  anything  at  all  to  do  with  a 
high  and  serious  moral  purpose.  • 

And  the  unfortunate  old  gentleman  knew  so 
absolutely  nothing  about  the  theater  or  about 
the  drama,  that  Miss  Peabody  spent  an  hour 
and  a  half  in  trying  to  instruct  him  as  to  the 
literary  point  of  view  of  Boston,  which  is  the 
center  of  the  serious  world.  She  committed 
herself  so  far  as  to  say  that  Flossie  was  a  dear 
little  thing.  She  had  to  get  the  words  out 
though  they  nearly  choked  her;  but  what,  she 
asked,  had  a  dear  little  thing  to  do  with  the 
high  region  of  starlit  thought  that  was  sym- 
bolized by  such  great  names  as  Emerson,  Long- 
fellow, Henry  Ward  Beecher  and  Nathaniel 
Hawthorne — not  to  mention  Walt  Whitman, 
and  Henrik  Ibsen  who  didn't  come  from  Bos- 
ton? She  pointed  out  delicately  that  although 
Mrs.  Foster  was  the  most  amiable  person  in  the 
world,  she  was  not  a  lady  of  whose  intellectual 
opinions  Mr.  Foster  himself  had  a  very  high 
view.  And  she  pointed  out,  too,  that  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end  of  this  theater  scheme, 
Mr.  Foster  must  really  have  been  actuated  by 
his  wife's  affection  for  dear  little  Flossie;  and 
she  sfot  him  to  see  at  last  that  that  was  not  a 


260  RING  FOR  NANCY 

very  rational  position,  and  she  got  him  at  last  to 
be  exceedingly  afraid  that  he  would  become  the 
laughing-stock  of  all  the  serious  people  who 
read  Emerson  and  Thoreau  and  Walt  Whitman, 
and  all  the  other  serious  American,  Noncon- 
formist and  Puritan  writers.  And  she  made 
him  understand  that  the  people  in  high  places 
who  could  confer  titles  read  nothing  else  but 
the  works  of  these  transatlantic  moralists.  Ab- 
solutely nothing  else. 

It  was  the  greatest  triumph  of  Miss  Pea- 
body's  career.  For,  before  she  let  Mr.  Foster  go 
to  bed,  she  had  extracted  from  him  a  promise — 
in  his  interests,  in  hers,  in  Mrs.  Foster's,  in  the 
major's,  and  even  in  dear  little  Flossie's  own 
interests — that  he  would  absolutely  suspend  any 
decision  about  the  theater — at  any  rate  for  a 
day  or  two — until  Miss  Peabody  had  had  an 
opportunity  of  talking  to  all  the  parties  con- 
cerned. She  was  convinced  that  she  would  be 
able  to  make  it  clear  even  to  Flossie  that  it 
could  only  do  her  harm  to  attempt  to  run  a 
theater  in  such  a  way  as  to  be  the  laughing- 
stock of  all  admirers  of  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes 
or  even  of  Mr.  Bernard  Shaw,  though  she  could 
not  be  quite  certain  that  Mr.  Shaw  was  always 
serious. 

The  praise  that  she  had  been  forced  to  bestow 
Upon  Miss  Delamare  made  Miss  Peabody  feel 


RING  FOR  NANCY  261 

actually  ill.  Each  time  that  she  called  Flossie  a 
dear  little  thing — and  she  did  it  half  a  dozen 
times  in  the  course  of  the  evening — her  hatred 
mounted  and  mounted.  And  nothing  would 
have  prevented  her  going  up  to  Flossie's  bed- 
room, and  giving  her  the  piece  of  her  mind, 
which  she  certainly  intended  to  do,  save  that  she 
really  felt  herself  too  shaky  to  do  herself  jus- 
tice. 

Mr.  Foster  went  rather  tremblingly  up  to 
bed.  Mrs.  Foster  was  lying  with  her  head  side- 
wise  on  the  pillow  and  her  eyes  open.  And  at 
first  Mr.  Foster  really  intended  to  do  his  un- 
dressing and  to  get  into  bed  without  saying  a 
word,  as  indeed  was  his  general  practise.  But 
while  he  was  loosening  his  braces  he  suddenly 
brought  out  the  words: 

**IVe  decided  to  suspend  my  judgment  about 
the  theater.*' 

Mrs.  Foster,  without  moving,  asked:  "That's 
all,  then?" 

"Well,  my  dear,"  Mr.  Foster  began  to  pro- 
test, "you  can  hardly  expect  more  than  that. 
There  are  an  immense  number  of  reasons  .  .  ." 

"I  don't  want  to  listen  to  any  reasons,"  Mrs, 
Foster  said.  "I  want  to  go  to  sleep.  Your 
money's  your  own,  and  your  risks  are  your 
own;  and  that's  all  there  is  to  say  about  it." 

And  Mr.  Foster  decided  to  leave  it  at  that. 


Ill 

A^ASTING  about  in  her  mind  for  something 
^^  that  would  aid  her  cause,  Miss  Peabody, 
in  the  early  morning,  hit  upon  the  idea  that 
if  she  used  a  little  skill,  she  might  be  able 
to  make  very  effective  use  of  her  ladyship's 
own  maid.  She  reflected  that  servants  were 
usually  venial,  untruthful  and  immoral,  and  she 
imagined  that  she  might  be  able  to  use  these 
qualities  in  the  excellent  work  of  ridding  that 
household  at  least  of  Miss  Delamare.  She 
began  to  foresee  that  she  might  even  rid  it  of 
Mrs.  Foster  herself,  though  that  was  a  very 
great  flight.  Accordingly,  after  the  major  and 
his  aunt  had  set  off  in  the  motor  for  London, 
she  rang  her  bedroom  bell  and  told  her  maid  to 
tell  her  ladyship's  own  maid  that  she  would 
be  obliged  by  an  interview.  Before,  however, 
she  let  her  own  servant  go,  she  inquired  as  to 
the  habits  and  customs  of  Miss  Jenkins. 

What  she  learned  was  mostly  that,  in  the 
opinion  of  her  own  maid,  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  could  scarcely  be  considered  a  servant. 
She  was  more  like  a  land-stewardess;  the  other 

262 


RING  FOR  NANCY  263 

servants  hardly  ever  saw  her.  She  lived  in  a 
housekeepers  room  of  her  own.  At  first  she  had 
been  waited  on  by  Mr.  Foster's  servants,  but 
yesterday  she  had  imported  an  own  maid  of 
her  own  from  the  county  town,  and  she  Hved 
more  sechided  than  ever.  Miss  Peabody's  maid 
informed  her  that  there  was  nothing  very  un- 
usual in  all  this,  though  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  carried  haughtiness  rather  further  than 
most,  treating  even  Saunders,  Mr.  Foster's 
butler,  at  a  great  distance,  though  most 
politely.  Miss  Peabody's  maid  knew  nothing 
to  speak  of  about  a  policeman.  She  had — 
like  all  the  other  servants — seen  Miss  Jenkins 
talking  to  a  policeman.  But  they  had  all 
wanted  to  talk  to  the  policemen,  and  there 
was  nothing  to  be  said  against  Miss  Jenkins' 
talking  to  him  first.  She  had  the  right,  con- 
sidering her  position,  and  the  officer  had 
touched  his  cap  to  her  most  civilly  and  re- 
spectfully. 

And  when  Miss  Peabody  had  said  that  all 
this  seemed  a  little  strange,  the  servant  had 
answered: 

"Oh,  dear  me,  no,  miss,"  and  she  added: 
"Not  at  all  strange,  miss,  that,  in  these  Radical 
times  with  heaven  knows  who,  and  foreigners, 
and    all    that,    ladies    like    her    ladyship's    own 


264  RING  FOR  NANCY  j 

maid    should    be    wishful    to    keep    themselves 
select." 

So  that  Miss  Peabody  thought  it  would  be 
better  to  leave  it  at  that.  She  realized  that 
her  task  was  more  formidable  than  she  had 
supposed,  and  it  was  with  a  certain  nervous- 
ness that  she  thanked  Miss  Jenkins  for  coming 
to  her  with  great  promptitude.  And  she  added 
at  once:  j 

"I  quite  understand.  Miss  Jenkins,  that  it 
would  be  useless  for  me  to  offer  you  any — any 
pecuniary  reward,  but  I  want  to  ask  you,  as 
from  one  woman  to  another,  whether  you  did 
not  think  that  the  present  position  of  affairs 
is  very  odd." 

And  it  relieved  her  immensely  when  Miss 
Jenkins  answered:     "Extremely  odd,  miss." 

And  then  Miss  Peabody  imagined  that  Miss 
Jenkins    might    not    understand    her,    and    she 
thought   to   make   her   position   quite   plain   by 
adding:     "I  mean  this  affair  of  Mrs.   Foster's    . 
.adopting  Miss  Delamare."  \ 

Miss  Jenkins  answered:  "I  perfectly  under- 
stand, miss." 

"So  that  you  won't  find  it  strange,"  Miss 
Peabody  continued,  "if  I  have  asked  you  to 
give  me  your  own  views  of  it  all." 

"It's  flattering,  miss,  if  I  may  say  so,"  her 


RING  FOR  NANCY  265 

ladyship's  own  maid  commented.  "But  as  to 
views  .  .  ." 

"Oh,"  Miss  Peabody  said  airily,  "I  thought 
you  might  have  some  little  information  to  give 
me  about  .  .  .  well,  about  just  anything.  Tri- 
fles, you  know  .  .  /' 

"Information!"  Miss  Jenkins  repeated. 

"They  say,  you  know,"  Miss  Peabody  said, 
"that  servants — let  us  say  onlookers — know 
more  of  us  than  we  know  ourselves.  And  you 
might  know  something  about  Miss  Delamare — 
just  as  by  accident  I  happen  to  have  observed 
the  little  incident  of  yourself  and  the  police- 
man .  .  ." 

Miss  Jenkins  said:  "The  policeman?"  And 
then  she  added:     "Oh!" 

And  Miss  Peabody  had  not  the  slightest 
doubt  that  the  small  start  which  Miss  Jenkins 
gave  was  indicative  at  least  of  a  perturbed  and 
probably  of  a  guilty  conscience.  She  continued 
therefore:  "Of  course,  I  don't  attach  any  im- 
portance to  such  a  little  thing,  but  still  .  .  .  you 
understand  ...  if  it  was  only  that  it  might  be 
regarded  as  a  mesalliance  .  .  ."  And  then  Miss 
Peabody  paused,  for  she  felt  she  was  upon 
dangerous  ground;  but  she  continued  at  last: 
"So  that  if  you  had  observed  any  little  things 
^ — trifles — in  the  behavior  of  Miss  Del  .  .  ." 


266  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"I  don't  think  I  have  observed  anything, 
miss,"  her  ladyship's  own  maid  rephed;  "not 
anything  that  one  could  really  mention  .  .  ." 

"But  I  think  you  might  as  well  mention  it," 
Miss  Peabody  said. 

Miss  Jenkins  answered:  "Oh,  no,  miss. 
They're  not  things  that  one  really  could  men- 
tion. I'm  certainly  not  going  to  mention 
them."  And  Miss  Jenkins'  Hps  closed  under 
Miss  Peabody's  eyes  so  firmly,  that  Miss  Pea- 
body  was  convinced  that  she  certainly  did  not 
mean  to  impart  any  of  the  unmentionable  things 
that  Miss  Peabody  imagined  her  to  have  seen. 
And  Miss  Peabody  had  to  reflect  for  a  minute. 
Then  she  gave  up  the  idea  of  trying  to  coerce 
her  ladyship's  own  maid.  It  simply  was  not, 
she  could  plainly  see,  to  be  done.  It  would  be 
much  better  to  seek  to  make  a  friend  of  her.  ' 
She  therefore  made  the  following  reasoned  and 
subduedly  passionate  appeal  to  the  feelings  of 
her  ladyship's   own   maid.  a 

"You  will  have  seen,"  she  said,  "and,  indeed,  1 
you  acknowledge  that  you  have  seen,  what  is 
going  on  in  this  house.  You  perceive  that  a 
young  lady — without  doubt  a  charming  young 
lady,  but  still  a  young  lady — has  obtained  such 
a  hold  over  the  mistress  of  the  house,  that  the 
entire  establishment  is  in  danger  of  misery  and 


RING  FOR  NANCY  W 

may  very  well  be  in  danger  of  ruin.  I  don't 
know  if  you  know  the  exact  circumstances.  This 
young  lady,  by  means  which  I  won't  specify, 
has  obtained  from  Mr.  Foster  an  absolute  prom- 
ise, not  only  to  start  a  theater  for  her,  but  to 
run  it  for  a  considerable  period  of  time.  Mr. 
Foster  is,  of  course,  an  exceedingly  wealthy 
man;  he  runs  a  hundred  and  fifty  bakers'  shops. 
But  you  probably  know  as  well  as  I  do  that  the 
expenses  of  a  theater  are  enormous,  and  that 
the  profits  of  a  hundred  and  fifty  bakers'  shops 
may  be  very  well  eaten  up  by  the  expenses  of 
less  than  one  theater.  Putting  the  matter  on 
this  basis,  this  young  lady  is  therefore  a  very^ 
dangerous — well,  let  me  say  adventuress." 

"I  quite  follow  you,  miss,"  her  ladyship's 
own   maid   said. 

"And  not  only  that,"  Miss  Peabody  con- 
tinued, "but  this  person  threatens  to  destroy 
the  peace  of  the  family  that  until  she  came  into 
it  was  exceedingly  united.  I  don't  think  it  can 
be  denied  that  her  influence  upon  this  family  is 
a  very  unhealthy  one.  She  has  obtained  over 
Mrs.  Foster  an  influence  which  can  only  be  sig- 
nalized by  that  one  word  'unhealthy,'  and  al- 
though I  have  no  wish  to  suggest  anything 
against  the  major,  her  influence  over  him  is 
bound  to  be  unhealthy  in  the  long  run.     Simi- 


268  RING  FOR  NANCY 

larly  it  is  not  healthy  for  Mr.  Foster — an  elderly 
and  impressionable  gentleman — to  be  closeted 
for  long  hours  with  a  young  and  attractive 
woman.  As  for  Mrs.  Foster,  her  attachment  to 
this  person  partakes  of  the  nature  of  an  imbecile 
obsession;  for  it  is  absolutely  unnatural  that  an 
old  woman  with  no  particular  brains,  provided 
with  a  most  excellent  husband,  an  attached 
nephew  and  a  prospective  niece-in-law  who  is 
ready  to  treat  her  with  all  the  kindness  that  she 
deserves — it  is  unthinkable  that  if  the  old  lady 
were  sane  and  healthy,  she  should  find  it  neces- 
sary to  adopt  a  casual  stranger  off  the  streets. 
I  suppose  you  understand  what  I  mean?'* 

"Well,  I  can  hear  what  you  are  saying,  miss," 
Miss  Jenkins  said. 

"Now  I  am  sure,"  Miss  Peabody  continued, 
"that  you  have  the  proper  feelings  that  do 
credit  to  our  common  womanhood,  and  I  am 
sure  that  you  will  do  all  that  you  can  to  put 
an  end  to  this  state  of  things." 

"Fm  sure  Fm  quite  ready  to,  miss,"  Miss 
Jenkins   said,   "but  .  .  ." 

"But!"  Miss  Peabody  ejaculated  almost  in- 
credulously. "Can  there  be  any  doubt  about 
it?  Can  you  have  any  hesitation  about  helping 
to  put  an  end  to  a  state  of  things  that  is  lament- 
able and  disgraceful  to  a  family  in  which  you 


RING  FOR  NANCY  269 

are  bound  to  take  some  interest?  Of  course,  I 
am  aware  that  you  may  say  you  are  in  this 
house  only  in  the  interests  of  Lady  Savylle. 
But  I  think  I  can  take  upon  myself  to  say  in 
your  mistress's  name  that  her  ladyship  would 
entirely  approve  of  your  attempt  to  break  down 
this  infamous  position." 

"Oh,  I  have  no  doubt  her  ladyship  would 
approve,^  Miss  Jenkins  said  slowly.  "The  only 
thing  is,  do  you  feel  perfectly  certain  that  things 
will  turn  out  exactly  as  you  wish?" 

"I  haven't  the  least  doubt  of  it,"  Miss  Pea- 
body  said.  "Only  give  me  a  hold  over  this  in- 
famous woman,  and  the  old  state  of  peace  will 
descend  upon  this  family." 

"I  don't  know,  miss,"  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  said;  "I  think  I  know  more  about  family 
quarrels  than  probably  you  do,  and  it  will  aston- 
ish you  how  people  split  up  and  fly  apart." 

"My  good  girl,"  Miss  Peabody  said  sharply, 
"I  am  probably  ten  or  fifteen  years  older  than 
you,  and  I  think  I  may  be  said  to  know  tKe 
world  quite  well  enough  to  be  able  to  manage 
my  own  affairs." 

"Of  course,  that's  as  it  may  be,"  Miss  Jenkins 
was  beginning,  when  Miss  Peabody  broke  in 
upon  her  speech. 

"Do  you  mean  to  say,"  she  exclaimed, — "but. 


270  RING  FOR  NANCY 

of  course,  you  wouldn't  dare  to  insinuate — that 
Major  Edward  will  not  fulfil  his  duty  to  me?" 

"Oh,  no,  miss,"  her  ladyship's  own  maid 
answered.  "That's  the  one  thing  in  the  situa- 
tion that  can  be  regarded  as  perfectly  certain — ^ 
that  Major  Foster  will  stick  to  his  duty." 

"Then,"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed  triumphant- 
ly, "what  do  you  propose  to  imagine  can  happen 
to  mef  You  don't  suppose  that  it's  my  inten- 
tion again  to  accuse  Miss  Delamare  of  indiscre- 
tions before  other  people?  That,  I  acknowl- 
edge, was  a  great  mistake  on  my  part,  but  I 
was  carried  away  by  my  legitimate  indignation. 
What  I  wish  to  do  is  to  obtain  a  private  hold 
over  Miss  Delamare." 

Miss  Jenkins  said,  "Oh!"  and  Miss  Peabody 
asked  her  sharply  what  she  meant. 

"I  only  mean,  miss,"  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  said,  "that  that  seems  the  proper — well, 
let  us  say  the  most  effective  course  you  can 
pursue." 

"I'm  glad  you  see  that/'  Miss  Peabody  said. 

"But  it  won't  be  so  very  easy,"  Miss  Jenkins 
answered. 

"I  have  got  an  absolute  trust  in  you,"  Miss 
Peabody  retorted.  "Of  course,  I  expect  you  to 
do  it  for  me." 

"I  don't  think  you  can  quite  expect  me  to  do 
that,  miss,"  her  ladyship's  own   maid  said. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  271 

"But  you're  acquainted  with  all  the  winding 
staircases  and  secret  doors  of  this  old  house  in 
a  way  no  one  else  here  can  approach/*  Miss 
Peabody  answered.  "And  you  do  listen  at 
doors.  We  know  from  the  other  night  that 
you  do  listen  at  doors." 

"But  I  only  listen  at  doors,  miss,"  her  lady- 
ship's own  maid  said,  "when  it  seems  likely 
that  there  will  be  a  misunderstanding  that  I  can 
smooth  out.  It's  my  duty  to  look  after  the 
reputation  of  her  ladyship's  house;  and,"  she 
continued,  "I  don't  think  it's  for  me  to  take  up 
the  business  of  a  spy,  and  I  should  strongly  ad- 
vise you,  miss,  not  to  have  anything  to  do  with 
it  either." 

"Spy!"  Miss  Peabody  said.  "Do  you  wish 
to  insult  me?" 

"Of  course,  miss,"  her  ladyship's  own  maid 
conceded,  "that's  all  a  matter  of  point  of  view. 
Of  course,  if  I  did  it,  I  should  feel  like  a  spy, 
supposing  that  any  harm  to  anybody  was  to 
come  of  it.  But  of  course  you,  miss,  may  feel 
like  a  righteous  detective  about  to  confront  a 
guilty  person." 

"Of  course,  that's  exactly  what  I  do  feel 
like,"  Miss  Peabody  said. 

"Then  your  conscience  is  probably  all  right," 
Miss  Jenkins  answered,  "and  I  don't  see  that 
there's  anything  more  to  be  said  about  it,  miss." 


Z72  RING  FOR  NANCY 

''Do  you  mean  to  say,"  Miss  Peabody  asked, 
"that  you  don't  mean  to  help  me?" 

"I  am  perfectly  ready,  miss,"  her  ladyship's 
own  maid  said,  "to  give  you  the  best  oppor- 
tunity in  the  world  for  spying  upon  Miss  Dela- 
mare  and  for  giving  her,  as  you  call  it,  a  piece 
of  your  mind.  Of  course,  I  don't  believe  it's 
much  use  your  trying  to  spy  upon  the  lady. 
Let  us  say  that's  only  because  she's  likely  to  be 
careful  as  long  as  she's  in  this  house,  and  not 
because   she's   naturally   a  virtuous   character." 

"I  feel  it  in  my  bones  that  she  isn't,"  Miss 
Peabody  said.  "I  feel  it  in  my  bones  that,  if  I 
could  get  a  quiet  talk  with  her  in  circumstances 
which  had  already  compromised  her  a  little,  by 
sheer  force  of  virtuous  indignation  I  could  so 
address  her  that  she  would  leave  this  household 
for  good,  crushed  and  overwhelmed." 

"I  don't  think  I  would  be  too  sure  of  that," 
said  Miss  Jenkins. 

"My  good  girl,"  Miss  Peabody  retorted,  "I've 
done  too  much  talking  to  abandoned  women  in 
my  time — you  forget  that  I'm  the  president  of 
the  Boston  Association  for  the  Suppression  of 
Sin — and  I  haven't  been  the  president  of  that 
society  for  ten  years  without  knowing  how  to 
deal  with  abandoned  women.  They're  like  wax 
in  my  fingers." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  273 

"That  may  very  well  be,  miss,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said;  *'but  can  you  be  perfectly  certain  that 
Miss  Delamare  is  an  abandoned  woman? 
There's  really  nothing  in  the  world  that's  ever 
been  said  against  her." 

*T  tell  you  I  feel  it,"  Miss  Peabody  said.  "I 
know  it.    I  shudder  when  I  think  of  her." 

"But  that,"  Miss  Jenkins  urged,  "may  be 
only  just  a  natural  antipathy — the  sort  of  anti- 
pathy that  some  people  have  for  Jews." 

"A  natural  antipathy!"  Miss  Peabody  ex- 
claimed. "Yes,  the  natural  antipathy  that  the 
virtuous  and  respectable  feel  for  the  frivolous, 
sordid,  degenerate,  thoughtless  and  idle  crea- 
tures of  their  own  sex."  And  rendered  the 
more  eager  by  Miss  Jenkins'  opposition.  Miss 
Peabody  exclaimed: 

"Only  give  me  the  opportunity  really  to  con- 
front that  viper,  and  I  will  give  her  such  a 
talking  to,  that  at  the  end  of  it  she  will  cer- 
tainly know  that  my  heel  is  upon  her  head." 

"Of  course,  I  can  do  what  you  wish,  miss," 
her  ladyship's  own  maid  said  reasonably,  "and 
of  course  it  may — it  probably  will — lead  to  driv- 
ing what  you  might  call  the  dragon  out  of  this 
household.  But  I  will  urge  you  not  to  do  it, 
miss.  Miss  Delamare  is  an  innocent  and  harm- 
less little  creature,  and  I'm  not  certain  that  if 


274  RING  FOR  NANCY 

you  attempt  to  harm  her  it  won't  recoil  upon 
your  own  head.  Indeed,  I  am  pretty  certain 
that  it  will." 

'*My  good  girl,"  Miss  Peabody  said  with  dig- 
nity, "that's  the  sort  of  sentimental  nonsense 
that  you  read  in  novelettes  in  the  servants'  hall. 
You  may  rely  upon  my  judgment,  that  of  a 
mature  woman,  and  you  may  be  certain  that 
anything  that  I  do,  or  anything  that  you  do  for 
me,  will  be  perfectly  justified." 

"I  shall  be  perfectly  justified,"  Miss  Jenkins 
answered  slowly;  "well,  I  hope  I  shall,  and  if 
I'm  not,  your  blood  will  be  upon  your  own 
head." 

"That's  a  ridiculous  phrase  again,  my  good 
girl,"  Miss  Peabody  said;  "so  let's  make  an  end 
of  this  nonsense.  I  simply  order  you  to  do 
what  I  have  suggested,  and  there's  an  end  of 
it." 

Miss  Jenkins  suddenly  looked  at  Miss  Pea- 
body. "Miss  Olympia,"  she  said  gravely,  "has 
it  ever  struck  you  as  quite  a  side  issue,  that  the 
arrangement  of  rooms  in  this  house  is  slightly 
questionable?  I  must  say  it  struck  me  as  ex- 
traordinary that  you  never  should  have  raised 
any  objection." 

Miss  Peabody  started  and  exclaimed:  "What 
do  you  mean?" 


}  RING  FOR  NANCY  275 

"Of  course,"  Miss  Jenkins  continued,  "I 
don't  want  to  raise  any  suspicions,  but  it  seems 
to  me  a  thing  that  might  be  changed,  that  pos- 
sibly ought  to  be  changed — that  the  major  and 
Miss  Delamare  should  have  rooms  side  by  side 
with  only  that  panel  in  between." 

Miss  Peabody  became  suddenly  the  vivid  red 
of  a  turkey-cock's  wattles.  She  opened  her 
mouth,  but  she  found  positively  no  words  to 
utter. 

"That  I  should  never  have  thought  of  it!" 
she  exclaimed. 

"Well,  it  has  always  struck  me  as  odd,  miss," 

Miss  Jenkins  answered,  "that  you  never  should." 

^       "Of    course    it    must    be    changed    at    once," 

K  Miss  Peabody  answered.     "It  must  be  changed 

P  immediately." 

"Of  course  it  shall  be,  miss,"  her  ladyship's 
own  maid  said.  "I  shall  see  to  that.  And  in 
view  of  what  you've  just  been  asking  of  me,  it 
seems  that  there  would  be  another  little  ar- 
rangement .  .  ."  Miss  Jenkins  hesitated,  and 
again  Miss  Peabody  asked  sharply: 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"I  hardly  like  to  suggest  it,  miss,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins said. 

"Nonsense!"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed.  "I 
order  you  to  do  so." 


276  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Fd  much  rather  you  thought  about  it,  miss/* 
her  ladyship's  own  maid  said.  "I  don't  really 
care  to  speak  of  such  things;"  and  faced  by  the 
new  firmness  of  Miss  Jenkins'  lips,  Miss  Pea- 
body  really  did  reflect. 

**If  you  consider  what  you've  asked  for,  miss," 
Miss  Jenkins  said,  "the  opportunity  for  de- 
nouncing Miss  Delamare  in  circumstances  that 
might  appear  slightly — well,  let  us  say  awkward 
for  her  .  .  ." 

Miss  Peabody  suddenly  shook  with  the  birth 
of  a  new  idea. 

"That's  it!"  she  exclaimed.  "That's  precisely 
it.  You  will  have  my  things  removed  to  the 
major's  room,  and  you  will  have  the  major's 
things  removed  to  my  room.  At  once;  with- 
out any  delay.  The  major  will  be  away  all  day, 
and  he  will  probably  not  return  until  late  at 
night.  And  you  will  give  him  no  intimation 
that  the  change  has  been  made.  I  positively 
refuse  to  allow  you  to  give  him  any  warning. 
And  then  he  will  come  up  to  my  room.  And 
we  shall  just  see  what  takes  place." 

Miss  Jenkins  remonstrated  with  Miss  Pea- 
body  for  so  long  that  Miss  Peabody  simply 
could  not  for  the  life  of  her  understand  why  she 
did  it.  She  could  only  in  the  end  put  it  down 
to   some   undeveloped   ideas   of  womanly   pro* 


* 


RING  FOR  NANCY  277 


priety  which  might  do  Miss  Jenkins  as  a  servant 
a  great  deal  of  credit,  but  which,  with  her 
superior  knowledge,  Miss  Peabody  considered 
to  be  the  merest  nonsense. 


IV. 

TN  spite  of  their  ideas  to  the  contrary,  the 
"*•  major  and  his  aunt  spent  a  long  day  in 
town — for  the  speciaHst  whom  they  went  to 
consult  about  the  major's  eyes  strongly  recom- 
mended them  to  get  all  the  distraction  they 
could.  He  said  that  what  the  major  chiefly 
needed  was  peace  of  mind,  and  with  the  amiatle 
penetration  that  these  people  sometimes  pos- 
sess, he  seemed  to  discern  that  the  Manor 
House,  Basildon,  if  one  of  the  quietest,  was  not 
one  of  the  most  restful  houses  in  the  United 
Kingdom. 

So  that,  first,  to  get  a  really  good  change  they 
went  to  interview  the  manager  of  the  book-stall 
business  that  had  issued  a  summons  against  the 
major.  This  gentleman  was  really  puzzled  by 
the  major's  plain  explanation.  He  could  not  un- 
derstand what  the  major  had  to  talk  to  Miss 
Delamare  about  with  such  concentration  when, 
as  Mrs.  Foster  insisted  on  explaining,  she  was 
the  major's  adopted  sister,  and  was  going  to 
stay  with  him  in  the  same  house.  It  did  not 
strike  the  manager  as  a  reasonable  explanation 
for  refusing  to  pay  for  four  and  twopence  worth 

278 


RING  FOR  NANCY  279 

of  magazines.  He  was  puzzled,  and  since  he  was 
manager  of  an  immense  business  and  had  all 
the  time  in  the  world  on  his  hands,  he  just 
listened  to  the  major's  fine  confusion  with  ami- 
ability and  for  a  tremendous  time — from  half 
past   eleven   until   twenty   past   twelve. 

Another  thing  that  he  could  not  understand 
was  the  major's  statement  that  for  magazines 
that  he  purchased  at  one  stall  he  paid  on  prin- 
ciple at  another.  The  major  explained  that  he 
was  a  shareholder  of  the  company  out  of  grati- 
tude to  the  novelist  who  had  helped  him  to  pass 
his  remarkable  examination;  and  that,  too,  the 
manager  was  unable  fully  to  understand.  The 
major  said  that  that  was  as  plain  as  eating 
eggs.  He  asked  the  manager  to  picture  for 
himself  what  sort  of  a  job  guarding  a  well  in 
Somaliland  was;  and  the  manager  said  that  he 
could  not  in  the  least  begin  to  imagine  it,  but 
that  he  had  a  son  who  had  just  come  back  from 
that  pleasant  country.  Then  it  turned  out  that 
the  manager's  son  was  Sammy  Lowes,  who  had 
had  charge  of  the  next  well  two  hundred  and 
seventy  miles  away,  and  that  the  major  had  put 
in  a  good  many  evenings  at  poker  over  the  tele- 
graph wire  with  Captain  Lowes,  though  he  had 
never  actually  met  his  next-door  neighbor.  He 
had  to  explain  then  how  you  could  play  poker 
by  telegram. 


280  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Then  he  returned  to  the  subject  of  the  nov-» 
elist  who  had  so  helped  him.  He  explained 
carefully  that  his  grim  determination  to  un- 
derstand every  sentence  that  that  gentleman 
had  ever  written  had  toughened  his  compre- 
hension to  such  an  extent  that  there  was  not  a 
single  thing  in  the  w^orld  that  he  could  not 
understand. 

The  manager  asked  some  one  on  his  telephone 
to  send  up  Mr.  Barnes;  and  Mr.  Barnes,  who 
was  introduced  as  the  company's  book  inspec- 
tor-general, declared  that  he  had  not  even  heard 
the  name  of  the  novelist.  He  went  away,  how- 
ever, and  then  returned  with  the  information 
that  he  had  got  from  a  subordinate,  that  not  a 
single  book  by  that  gentleman  had  ever  been 
sold  at  their  stalls.  He  appeared  to  be  asked 
for,  however,  in  the  circulating  department,  and 
there  was  one  solitary  exception.  Kew  had 
brought  nine  copies — thirteen  being  counted  as 
twelve — of  a  work  by  this  writer. 

"So  that,"  the  book  inspector-general  said, 
"you  can  pretty  well  tell  that  he's  one  of  your 
intellectuals."  And  the  manager  nodded  his 
head  in  cordial  agreement. 

"But  hang  it  all,"  the  major  .asked,  ''how  can 
you  tell?" 

The  manager  looked  at  his  inspector-general 
of  literature. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  281 

"Oh,"  the  inspector-general  remarked  gloom- 
ily, "you  can  tell  because  really  intellectual  peo- 
ple never  buy  nezv.  It's  only  intellectual  people 
that  have  discovered  that  you  can  buy  library 
copies  for  a  shilling  after  they  have  already  been 
used." 

"Now  can  you  do  that?"  Mrs.  Foster  asked. 
"But  it  seems  rather  mean,  doesn't  it?" 

"It's  only  intellectual  people,"  the  inspector 
answered,  "only  quite  intellectual  people  who 
know^  how  to  be  really  mean.  And  the  fact  of 
the  sale  of  three  copies  at  Kew  goes  to  back  up 
my  contention.  For  Kew  is  where  we  sell  only 
the  very  crankiest  of  stuff — health  periodicals 
and  the  halfcrown  monthlies.  So  if  there  wasn't 
vegetarianism  in  that  particular  book,  there 
must  certainly  have  been  Christian  Science  or 
spiritualism." 

The  major  said:  "Oh,"  and  then  he  added: 
"You  call  it  spiritualism." 

"Then  there  we  are,"  the  inspector  said  tri- 
umphantly. 

"There,"  the  major  remarked  politely,  "in  a 
manner  of  speaking,  you  may  safely  say  we  all 
certainly  are." 

"But,"  the  manager  hazarded  when  the  in- 
spector had  gone,  "I  may  be  frightfully  stupid, 
but  I  can't  in  the  least  see  how  where  we  stand, 
wherever   it   is,    interferes    with   your   frightful 


282  RING  FOR  NANCY 

crime  of  stealing  periodicals  from  a  railway 
book-stall." 

*'But,"  the  major  said,  "it's  just  established 
that  I'm  an  intellectual." 

"No  defense  at  all,"  the  manager  said  grave- 
ly; "there  can  be  no  crime  more  mean  than 
steaHng  from  a  book-stall.  You  are  a  share- 
holder, and  you  won't  deny  that  it's  the  very 
height  of  meanness.  It's  not  as  if  books  were 
bread,  or  anything  necessary  or  important.  And 
we've  just  established  that  the  intellectuals  are 
the  only  people  who  know  how  to  be  thor- 
oughly and  efficiently  mean.  For  what  in  the 
world  can  be  meaner  than  buying  second-hand 
library  copies,  thus  robbing  us  of  our  legitimate 
profit,  and  the  writer  of  any  profit  at  all?  You 
confess  that  you  belong  to  the  meanest  class  in 
the  world  .  .  ." 

"But  I  don't  feel  in  the  least  like  an  intel- 
lectual," the  major  said  penitently.  "I  never 
knew  I  was  till  this  moment." 

"You  certainly  don't  look  like  one,"  the  man- 
ager said  encouragingly. 

"And  I  certainly  never,"  the  major  said, 
"bought  a  library  copy  in  my  .  .  ."  He  stopped, 
and  then  he  exclaimed  slowly,  and  with  his  face 
of  awe,  "My  God!  Every  one  of  his  hooks  that  I 
had  in  Somaliland  had  a  canceled  yellow  label  out- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  283 

side  itr  And  he  stopped  as  if  he  were  really 
terror-stricken. 

"Then  there,"  the  manager  said,  "you  really 
are.  You  are  convicted  of  the  stupidity — it's 
worse  than  a  crime,  considering  the  advantages 
we  offer  the  public — of  dealing  with  any  firm 
other  than  us.  For  we  do  not  deface  our  library 
copies  with  yellow  labels,  contenting  ourselves 
with  a  chaste  stamp  on  the  title  page.  And — 
though  that  does  not  matter  so  much — you  have 
received  great  benefits  at  the  hands  of  a  dis- 
tinguished personage  without  making  him  one 
penny  the  richer." 

"Good  heavens!"  the  major  exclaimed. 
"Doesn't  he  get  any  thing?" 

"Not  one  penny!"  the  manager  answered. 
"So  that  you  are  branded  as  belonging  to  that 
infamous  band  of  sweaters,  the  purchasers  of 
library  copies.  You  are  plainly  a  sweater,  and 
you  stand  in  danger  of  being  convicted  for 
theft." 

Mrs.  Foster  protested  that  her  Edward  could 
never  be  called  a  thief,  but  the  manager  gravely 
but  firmly  presented  her  with  many  facts  con- 
cerning the  financial  side  of  what  he  styled  an 
infamous  and  unsanitary  transaction. 

But  gradually  the  major  became  more  cheer- 
ful.   "After  all,"  he  said,  "I  could  not  know  any- 


284  RING  FOR  NANCY 

thing  about  the  matter.  A  great  parcel  of  books 
was  sent  me  by;  Charles  Grand — he  was  a  jour- 
nalist I  knew  at  Simla,  and  he  is  now  reviewing 
for  the  London  newspapers  .  .  ." 

"Then,"  the  manager  said  quietly  but  very 
sadly,  "the  majority  of  them  were  review  copies 
which  your  friend  received  for  nothing  and  sold 
to  you  for  two  shillings." 

"But,"  the  major  exclaimed,  "is  there  nothing 
but  villainy  in  your  business?" 

"Nothing!"  the  manager  answered  still  very 
sadly.  "The  authors  are  only  fools,  but  the 
readers  are  sweaters,  and  the  pubhshers — well, 
the  less  I  say  about  publishers  the  less  I  shall 
have  to  answer  for  in  the  courts  of  my  country; 
but  all  reviewers  are  villains.  The  only  bright 
spot  is  the  book-stall,  where  everything  is 
above-board !" 

"Well,  Fm  glad  to  know  that  I  was  right," 
the  major  said. 

"Right!"  the  manager  exclaimed.  "You've 
never  been  right  in  your  life!" 

"But  I  was,"  the  major  said,  "when  I  took 
shares  in  your  company,  in  order  to  influence 
the  sales  of  the  author  to  whom  I  am  grateful." 

The  manager  became  instantly  attentive. 
"And  how  do  you  propose  to  do  that?"  he 
asked. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  285 

"I  am  doing  it  already,'*  the  major  answered. 
"I  never  go  near  a  book-stall  without  asking  for 
the  works  of  my  benefactor.  And  when  they 
are  not  to  be  had,  I  lecture  the  book-stall  boy 
very  severely.     I  say  that  I  am  a  shareholder 

"I  trust,"  the  manager  interrupted  him,  "that 
you  have  never  found  any  of  the  works  of  this 
author  upon  our  book-stalls?" 

"Never!"  the  major  exclaimed. 

"Then  that's  all  right,"  the  manager  said, 
"and  you  may  continue  with  your  explanation." 

"I  tell  the  book-stall  clerk,"  the  major  accord- 
ingly continued,  "that  I  am  a  shareholder,  and 
that  I  insist  upon  his  ordering  all  the  novels 
of  that  author." 

"And  do  you  ever  notice  that  it  has  been 
done?"  the  manager  asked. 

"I  have  never  been  able  to  discover  that  it 
has,"  the  major  said. 

"Well,"  the  manager  continued,  "it's  best  to 
make  certain,"  and  he  took  the  telephone  which 
stood  on  the  desk  before  him.  "Barnes,"  he  re- 
marked into  that  instrument,  "will  you  kindly 
give  instructions  that  no  books  by  the  author 
of  What  Maisie  Knew  are  ever  put  on  sale  upon 
the  stalls,  except,  of  course,  as  library  copies?" 
He  put  down  the  telephone,  and    looking  con- 


286  RING  FOR  NANCY 

tentedly  at  the  major,  he  remarked:  "So  that's 
all  right.     We  had  better  go  to  Waterloo." 

"But  I  don't  in  the  least  understand,"  the 
major  said. 

"Oh,  that's  all  right,  that's  all  right,"  the 
manager   answered.     "It's   all  perfectly   right." 

"But  it  seems  to  me  .  .  ."  the  major  said. 

"It  seems  to  me,"  Mrs.  Foster  remarked, 
"that  you  have  just  prevented  the  books  of  your 
friend  from  being  sold  at  all." 

"That  was  exactly  what  was  wanted,"  the 
manager  said.  "Here  we  were  in  the  face  of  an 
atrocious  conspiracy  to  plant  upon  our  firm 
books  that  couldn't  possibly  be  sold.  I  have 
fortunately  put  an  end  to  that." 

"But  hang  it  all!  .  .  ."  the  major  said. 

The  manager  looked  gravely  and  benevo- 
lently at  the  major. 

"My  dear  young  friend,  don't  become  ex- 
cited," he  advised.  "I  observe  in  you  a  distinct 
tendency  to  become  excited.  I  can  only  imagine 
that  comes  from  the  class  of  literature  that  you 
have  been  reading.  Now  take  my  advice.  Give 
it  up.    Just  give  it  up." 

"But,  confound  your  impertinence,"  the  major 
exclaimed  hotly,  "it  has  made  me  the  youngest 
major  in  the  British  army." 

"There,  there,  there,  there,  there!"  the  man- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  287 

ager  said.  "Hush!  Hush!  I  can  not  imagine 
what  possible  advantage  it  can  be  to  be  the 
youngest  major  in  the  British  army.  But  just 
you  take  my  advice.  When  you  came  in  I  was, 
reading  a  book.  I  am  an  exceedingly  busy  man, 
so  it's  absolutely  necessary  that  at  times  I 
should  relax  my  mind.  That  is  to  say,  some- 
times, even  in  office  hours,  I  take  up  a  book  and 
read.  Let  me  tell  you,  my  young  friend,  that 
there's  nothing  so  salutary  in  the  world  as  liter- 
ature. And  I  consider  that  I,  as  the  manager  of 
this  great  business,  and  you  as  one  of  its  share- 
holders, are  conferring  upon  humanity  the 
greatest  boon  that  this  century  .  .  ." 

"My  dear  chap,"  the  major  said,  "this  isn't  a 
dinner  to  the  Newsvenders'  Benevolent  Asso- 
ciation, or  whatever  it  is  where  you  make 
speeches  like  that." 

"The  purpose  of  literature,"  the  manager  con- 
tinued, "is  to  refresh,  to  recreate,  to  enlighten, 
to  uplift.  Buried  deep  in  the  soothing  pages  of 
a  book,  how  blissfully  the  soul  pursues  its 
course!  With  what  a  smooth  current  do  the 
minutes  pass,  with  what  a  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  hang  it  all!"  the  major  exclaimed.  "I 
can't  stand  this.  This  is  like  listening  to  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  reading  aloud." 

"And  it  was  precisely  to  the  works  of  that 


288  RING  FOR  NANCY 

great  and  splendid  writer,"  the  manager  said, 
"that  I  was  desiring  to  direct  your  attention.  If 
you  would  go  round  the  book-stalls  now  and 
observe  whether  there  are  any  works  of  that  lady 
to  be  seen,  I  should  be  pleased  to  empower  you 
to  threaten  to  horsewhip  any  book-stall  clerk 
whose  stall  did  not  display  at  least  six  copies  of 
six  different  works  by  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  in  a 
very  prominent  position.  In  the  most  prominent 
place  he  can  give  them,  indeed." 

"Then,"  Mrs.  Foster  suddenly  asked  the  man- 
ager, "Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  really  is  a  great  writ- 
er?" 

"Madam,"  the  manager  said  impressively, 
"Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  is  the  greatest  writer  the 
world  has  ever  seen.  You  can  prove  it  by  every 
possible  means.  Do  you  wish  to  prove  it  by 
statistics?  Then  let  me  tell  you  that  the  com- 
plete works  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  had  enjoyed  up 
to  the  day  before  yesterday  a  world  sale  of 
seventeen  and  a  half  million  copies.  Supposing 
all  these  volumes  were  stacked  on  their  sides, 
they  would  reach  from  here  to  the  moon.  Sup- 
posing them  to  be  laid  end  to  end,  they  would 
reach  twice  from  here  to  the  moon  and  back. 
The  mere  quantity  of  printers'  ink  employed  in 
their  production  has  been  eight  and  a  half 
thousand  gallons.  To  make  the  paper  required 
for  them  one  entire  forest  in  the  colonv  of  New- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  289 

foundland,  several  woods  in  Norway,  and  the 
entire  output  of  rags  for  one  year  of  a  city  the 
size  of  Liverpool  have  been  required." 

"This  is  extremely  interesting,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said.  "I'm  sure  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  will  be  de- 
lighted to  know  this."  She  looked  at  the  major 
reflectively.  "My  dear  Edward,"  she  said,  "I 
sometimes  thought  that  I  should  like  you  to 
marry  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe.  But  now  that  I  have 
heard  these  beautiful  facts,  my  mind  is  more  at 
rest  upon  the  subject.  Of  course,  in  my  heart 
I  should  much  prefer  you  to  marry  Miss  Dela- 
mare.  And  I  am  sure  both  ladies  are  only  just 
waiting  to  be  asked,  to  jump  down  your  throat." 

The  manager  suddenly  stood  up.  "Do  I  un- 
derstand," he  said,  with  an  accent  almost  of 
awe,  "that  I  am  talking  to  people  who  are  upon 
intimate  terms  with  those  two  great  ornaments 
of  the  social  life  of  the  day — Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
and  Miss  Flossie  Delamare?" 

"But  they  are  both  stopping  with  us  at  the 
present  moment,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "And  they 
are  both  most  extremely  anxious  to  marry  my 
nephew.  At  least,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  is,  though 
I  don't  know  how  it  may  be  with  Miss  Dela- 
mare, for,  of  course,  she's  my  adopted  daughter, 
and  the  major's  my  adopted  son,  so  perhaps 
the  church  would  forbid  the  marriage.  I  am 
not  very  clever  at  these  things.'* 


290  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"You've  been  extremely  clever,  madam,"  the 
manager  said,  "in  adopting  a  distinguished  and 
charming  family;  and  I  trust  that  whtn  your 
son  does  marry,  he  will  permit  me  to  present  to 
the  bride,  v^hichever  lady  she  may  be,  a  com- 
plete set  of  the  works  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
bound  in  our  half-roan  with  gilt  backs  and 
marble  tops.  There  could  be  no  present  in  the 
world  more  appropriate  to  a  newly  married 
lady,  for  these  books  will  refresh  and  recreate 
her  weary  hours  .  .  ." 

"Well,  I'm  sure  I'm  much  obliged,"  the  major 
said. 

"Of  course,"  the  manager  continued,  address- 
ing Mrs.  Foster,  "I  imagine  that  from  the  sam- 
ples of  your  nephew's  conversation  and  be- 
havior that  I  have  been  privileged  to  hear  and 
to  hear  of,  her  weary  hours — or  at  any  rate 
her  unexcited  hours — will  be  quite  few  and  far 
between.  But  I  can  imagine  nothing  better 
calculated  to  engross  the  mind  and  to  relieve  it 
of  gloomy  thoughts  while,  say,  the  lady  is  wait- 
ing in  the  corridors  of  a  police-court,  or  during 
the  assizes,  while  she  is  expecting  the  verdict 
of  the  jury  who  will  retire  to  consider  it — I  can 
not  imagine  anything  better  calculated  to  dis- 
tract the  mind  than  any  volume  by  the  author  of 
Pink  Passions  or  Crime  in  a  Nightgozvn/'     The 


RING  FOR  NANCY  291 

manager  pulled  out  his  watch.  "Thank 
heaven!"  he  exclaimed;  "it's  twenty  past 
twelve.     Now  let's  go  to  Waterloo." 

"But  what  are  we  going  to  Waterloo  for?" 
the  major  asked. 

"To  investigate  on  the  spot,"  the  manager 
answered,  "the  details  of  your  sordid  crime." 

"But  that  will  be  taking  up  a  tremendous 
amount  of  your  time,"  Mrs.  Foster  said. 

"My  dear  lady,"  the  manager  answered, 
"that's  exactly  what  I  want.  Do  you  suppose 
that  a  man  like  myself  has  anything  in  the 
world  to  do?  I  am  the  head  of  one  of  the  most 
important,  of  one  of  the  most  extended  enter- 
prises in  the  world.  We  employ  nine  hundred 
and  seventy  carts  in  the  distribution  of  weekly 
periodicals  alone.  And  is  it  thinkable  that  I — 
the  head  of  this  great  business — should  have 
anything  in  the  world  to  do?" 

"But  I  should  have  thought  .  .  ."  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter began  timidly. 

"My  dear  lady,"  the  manager  said,  "just  re- 
flect for  a  moment.  What  is  the  secret  of  busi- 
ness success?  What  is  it  that  makes  an  enter- 
prise run  smoothly  once  it  has  started  on  its 
proud  career?  I  will  tell  you.  The  secret  of  all 
these  things  is  efficient  subordinates.  Now  my 
subordinates    are    so    absolutely    efficient    that 


b 


292  RING  FOR  NANCY 


1 


there  is  nothing  in  the  world  left  for  me  to  do. 
I  sit  here  for  whole  mornings  playing  patience, 
or  reading  the  works  of  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  or  in 
the  alternative  simply  twiddling  my  thumbs  and 
praying  heaven  for  an  occupation.  Thanks  to 
yourself  and  the  major,  my  mind  has  been  occu- 
pied from  half  past  eleven  till  twenty  minutes 
past  twelve  by  this  extraordinary  and  engross- 
ing story  of  passion  and  crime." 

"Oh,  hang  it  all!"  the  major  said,  "where 
does  the  passion  come  in?" 

*T  have  gathered,"  the  manager  answered,  "in 
the  course  of  our  conversation,  that  you  are  en- 
gaged to  at  least  two  ladies,  and  that  at  least 
two  other  ladies  are  anxious  to  marry  you.  Of 
course,  it  is  no  affair  of  mine;  but  I  can  easily 
gather  from  these  glimpses  of  the  background 
of  affairs  of  the  heart  what  thrilling  situations, 
what  tremendous  escapes  and  outpourings  of 
the  soul  must  occur  in  the  course  of  your  daily 
life.  What  a  subject  for  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe! 
And  how  eagerly,  did  it  only  know  the  circum- 
stances, would  the  public  await  that  lady's  next 
volume.  But  now  let  us  go  to  Waterloo.  As  I 
have  said,  I  have  been  in  an  agony  all  this 
morning  for  the  want  of  an  occupation.  And 
now  that  I  have  a  chance  to  make  a  criminal 
investigation  on  my  own  account,  is  it  to  be 


RING  FOR  NANCY  293 

thought  that  I  will  let  the  matter  drop  until  I 
have  sifted  it  to  the  bitter  end?" 

They  drove  to  Waterloo  in  the  motor  that  had 
brought  them  up  from  Basildon.  And  there  the 
manager  interviev^ed  the  book-stall  clerk,  whose 
manner  was  respectful  while  it  was  self-respect- 
ing, and  the  book-stall  boy,  who  was  in  tears. 
The  book-stall  boy  declared  that  he  had  certain- 
ly found  eight  sixpenny  magazines,  one  penny 
daily,  and  two  halfpenny  dailies  upon  his  stall. 
And  these  he  had  sent  back  to  the  central  ofHce 
as  "returns,"  because  he  did  not  know  what  else 
in  the  world  to  do  with  them.  Similarly,  he  had 
found  upon  his  stall  the  half-sovereign  that  the 
major  had  thrown  there,  and  this  he  had  taken 
to  the  Lost  Property  Office  which,  he  under- 
stood, was  the  correct  thing  to  do.  At  the  end 
of  three  months,  if  the  major  did  not  in  the 
meantime  identify  his  coin,  the  half-sovereign 
would  have  become  the  property  of  the  paper- 
boy. 

*Tt  results  from  all  this" — the  manager  ad- 
dressed the  major  and  his  aunt — "that,  although 
an  obvious  attempt  at  theft  was  made,  yet,  the 
offender  having  returned  the  stolen  goods,  and 
made  an  honest  though  mistaken  attempt  to  pay 
for  them,  the  company — though  I  say  it  re- 
gretfully— would  hardly  be  justified  in  attempt- 


294  RING  FOR  NANCY 

ing  to  prosecute  the  offender  who  might  be 
very  difficult  to  identify." 

"But  hang  it  all!"  the  major  said. 

"That,  my  young  friend/'  the  manager  re- 
plied, "is  the  fifth  time  that  you  have  said, 
*Hang  it  all!'  in  the  course  of  an  hour.  I  can 
only  put  down  the  smallness  of  your  vocabulary 
to  the  nature  of  your  favorite  literature.  For 
books,  while  they  refresh  the  mind,  recreate 
the  senses,  and  are  boons  to  minds  weary  and 
depressed  .  .  ."  The  manager's  eye  at  this  mo- 
ment fell  upon  the  clock  that,  upon  the  main 
line  departure  platform,  marked  the  hour  of 
one.  "God  bless  my  soul!"  he  said.  "Let's  all 
go  and  have  lunch  together.  That  is  to  say,  I 
shall  be  delighted  if  you  will  lunch  with  me, 
for  I  am  extremely  obliged  to  you  for  getting 
me  through  this  morning.  For  this  afternoon 
I  am  safe,  since  I  have  an  engagement  to  play 
golf  with  the  manager  of  the  P.Q.Q.G.,  who, 
let  me  tell  you,  is  one  of  the  busiest  men  of 
our  busy  commercial  world." 


V 

^T^HEY  lunched  at  an  excellent  and  ex- 
•*•  tremely  costly  restaurant  that  was  hidden 
way  in  a  dirty  back  alley,  behind  Token- 
house  Yard.  Here  they  had  the  opportunity  of 
inspecting  the  features  of  gentlemen  who,  the 
manager  assured  them,  were  the  twenty-seven 
busiest  men  of  their  great  commercial  world. 
He  also  told  them  that  they  might,  if  they  im- 
agined carefully,  imagine  that  there  they  heard 
the  very  wheels  of  London  finance  whirring 
along.  But  when  they  listened  with  attention, 
the  sound  most  audible  to  them  was  made  by 
the  head  of  the  firm  of  Howe,  Hough,  Blades 
and  Kershaw,  who  was  snuffling  over  his  soup. 

"Well,"  the  manager  said  reflectively  when 
they  had  finished  lunch,  "I'm  very  much  obliged 
to  you  for  your  society  and  for  clearing  up  the 
mystery." 

"But  there  could  not  have  been  any  mystery," 
the  major  said.  "You  can't  really  have  sus- 
pected me  of  wanting  to  steal  four  and  tuppence 
worth  of  cheap  literature!" 

"Oh,  that  wasn't  the  mystery,"  the  manager 
295 


L 


296  RING  FOR  NANCY 

answered.  "You  see,  for  a  long  time  past  I 
have  been  puzzled  by  reports  from  various 
book-stalls  of  a  gentleman — and  all  the  clerks 
reported  that  he  was  strange  in  his  manner — 
who  insisted  on  their  providing  their  stalls  with 
copies  of  works  that  couldn't  by  any  imagin- 
able probability  ever  get  sold.  And  what  I 
really  wanted  was  to  get  the  facts  of  this  sin- 
gular proceeding  and  if  possible  to  put  an  end 
to  it.     I  think  I  have  done  that." 

"I  think  I  must  acknowledge  that  you  have 
done  that,"  the  major  said  rather  ruefully. 

"Henceforth  the  book-stalls  will  be  protected 
from  these  spurious  demands,"  the  manager 
continued  amiably.  "I  think  you  will  acknowl- 
edge that,  too." 

"I  think  I  must,"  the  major  conceded;  and 
then  he  asked:  "You  don't  happen  to  be  an 
Irishman  by  any  chance?" 

"No,  I  was  born  in  Peckham,"  the  manager 
answered, — "silly  Peckham." 

"But  probably  under  the  table  of  a  solicitor's 
clerk,"  the  major  commented. 

"Oh,  no,"  the  manager  answered.  "Just  in 
the  usual  ordinary  common-sense  parsley-bed." 
He  had  accompanied  them  to  the  opening  of  the 
dirty  court  where  their  motor-car  was  awaiting 
them,   and  he  held  up  his  finger  to  a  taxicab. 


RING  FOR  NANCY  297 

"You  see/*  he  said,  "what's  the  trouble  with  all 
you  Irish  people  is  that  you  are  too  clever  by 
half,  whereas  we  who  are  born  in  Peckham  are 
only  just  clever  enough.  That's  what  gives  us 
our  immense  pull."  He  recommended  them 
very  strongly,  if  they  wanted  to  be  interested, 
to  go  to  the  matinee  of  Pigs  is  Pigs  and  see 
how  they  liked  it  without  Miss  Delamare  as  the 
leading  lady.  And  this  they  really  did.  The 
major,  who  had  never  seen  this  entertaining 
work  which  united  in  itself  the  talents  of  two 
authors  and  three  musical  composers,  was  quite 
interested  in  its  simple  display;  but  Mrs.  Foster 
said  that  it  was  not  worth  seeing  in  the  absence 
of  the  "symphonic  embodiment  of  quaint  im- 
beciHty."  Afterward  they  dined  in  the  ladies' 
room  of  the  major's  club,  and  there  the  major 
met  a  man  whom  he  had  not  seen  for  eleven 
years.  And  Mrs.  Foster,  who  had  really  a  great 
dread  of  traveHng  in  the  motor  by  night,  went 
back  to  Basildon  by  the  eight  forty-three,  so 
that  the  major  should  have  his  talk  out  with 
his  old  friend.  She  insised  on  this  because  she 
wished  him  to  have  a  very  thorough  change. 
It  may  have  been  a  quarter  past  ten  when 
the  major  left  his  club  steps  in  the  large  motor. 
And  as  the  roads  were  quite  empty,  and  the 
moonlight  very  bright,  they  got  full  forty  miles 


298  RING  FOR  NANCY 

an  hour  out  of  her,  and  he  reached  Basildon 
Manor  not  much  more  than  twenty  minutes 
after  his  aunt,  who  had  gone  straight  up  to 
Miss  Delamare.  He  himself  went  straight  up 
to  his  own  room. 

Mr.  Arthur  Foster  had  spent  a  tranquil  but 
somewhat  tiring  day  over  the  amalgamation  of 
the  two  societies  that  were  interested  in  the 
cause  of  virtue,  and  it  was  not  until  just  before 
dinner  that  he  went  up  to  his  room  to  dress. 
Then  he  discovered  that  all  his  things  had  been 
cleared  out.  He  rang  the  bell,  which  was  an- 
swered by  Mrs.  Foster's  maid,  and  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter's maid  said  she  knew  nothing  about  it,  but 
she  would  ask  her  ladyship's  own  maid. 

Her  ladyship's  own  maid  waited  upon  Mr. 
Foster  and  informed  him  that  such  were  Mrs. 
Foster's  orders.  She  could  not  help  it;  she  was 
not  responsible  for  it.  She  had  just  done  what 
she  was  told.  Mr.  Foster  protested  lamenta- 
bly; he  wanted  her  ladyship's  own  maid  to 
inform  him  what  he  had  done,  that  at  this  time 
of  life  he  should  be  moved  around  the  house 
like  a  parcel  sent  by  post.  Her  ladyship's 
own  maid  could  only  say  that  the  room  which 
had  been  allotted  to  Mr.  Foster  was  thoroughly 
comfortable  and  perfectly  pretty,  being  the 
room  which  was  called  the  pink  room. 


9 


RING  FOR  NANCY  299 

"But  what  have  I  done?"  Mr.  Foster  asked 
mildly. 

Miss  Jenkins  reflected  for  a  moment,  and 
then  she  said  slowly:  "Mrs.  Foster,  I  believe, 
is  extremely  angry  because  you  have  not  signed 
the  contract  with  Miss  Delamare.  I  believe 
that  is  the  reason." 

"Well,  but  what  am  I  to  do?"  Mr.  Foster 
said. 

"It  isn't  for  me  to  advise  you,  sir,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins said;  "but  if  I  might  suggest,  I  should  say 
that  you  ought  to  sign  that  contract  immedi- 
ately after  dinner,  and  then,  as  I  imagine  Miss' 
Peabody  will  be  thoroughly  angry,  I  should 
advise  you  to  stop  with  the  other  ladies  until 
about  half  past  ten,  and  then  go  to  your  room 
and  wait  quietly  till  Mrs.  Foster  comes  back. 
For  I  may  say  that  I  know  pretty  well  what 
women  are,  and  I  think,  sir,  if  you  give  proof 
of  deference  to  Mrs.  Foster's  wishes  and  of 
obedience  to  her  commands,  she  will  probably 
be  inclined  to  forgive  you." 

"But  this  is  awful,"  Mr.  Foster  said.  "I 
simply  daren't  sign  that  contract." 

"You  will  find  it  much  more  awful  if  you 
don't,  sir,"  Miss  Jenkins  said.  "Mrs.  Foster  is 
determined  not  to  speak  another  word  to  you." 

Mr.  Foster  groaned  and  groaned.  And  then 
he  permitted  Miss  Jenkins  to  lead  him  to  the 


300  RING  FOR  NANCY  » 

pink  room,  where  he  dressed  for  dinner.  At 
dinner  he  sat  pallid  and  depressed,  and  did 
nothing  to  enliven  the  conversation  of  the  three 
ladies  who  were  under  his  charge.  But,  having 
drunk  three  and  a  half  glasses  of  Moselle,  two 
of  champagne,  two  of  port,  and  one  of  liqueur 
brandy  which  he  took  with  his  coffee,  he  joined 
the  ladies  with  a  firm  step  and  courageous 
manner.  I 

**Miss  Delamare,"  he  exclaimed  in  loud  tones, 
"if  you  will  kindly  bring  me  that  contract  for 
the  new  theater,  I  will  go  into  my  study  and 
sign  it  with  you  at  once.  Miss  Jenkins  and  one 
of  the  other  servants  can  be  the  witnesses." 

Miss  Peabody  started  violently  and  opened 
her  mouth,  but  as  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  pres- 
ent, she  did  not  feel  that  it  would  be  wise  to 
make  any  remark.  And  Mr.  Foster  remained 
under  the  shelter  of  the  presence  of  Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  until  Miss  Delamare  returned  with  the 
contract.  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  was  talking  about 
the  end  of  the  third  act  of  her  play.  And  she 
went  on  talking  about  it  to  Miss  Peabody  until 
ten  minutes  after  Mr.  Foster  and  Miss  Dela- 
mare had  gone  away.  Then  she  perceived  that 
Miss  Peabody  had  fainted  in  her  grandfather^s 
chair. 

It  was  not  for  nearly  an  hour  and  a  half  that 


RING  FOR  NANCY  301 

she  was  brought  round.  Under  the  ministra- 
tions of  her  own  maid,  her  ladyship's  own 
maid  and  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  she  had  cold  rigors, 
warm  heats,  and  finally  a  real  and  typical  fit  of 
hysterics.  It  being  then  about  a  quarter  past 
ten,  Miss  Jenkins  suggested  that  she  had  bet- 
ter drink  a  little  whisky  and  water  and  then 
go  quietly  to  bed. 

**I  am  not  going  to  bed"  Miss  Peabody  said; 
but  as  she  had  been  talking  nonsense — sheer 
simple  nonsense — for  the  last  three-quarters  of 
an  hour,  no  one  took  any  particular  notice  of 
the  speech,  and  her  own  maid  and  her  lady- 
ship's own  maid  conducted  her  up  to  her  room 
which  was  by  now  the  room  with  the  panel. 
She  dismissed  her  own  maid,  but  she  begged 
Miss  Jenkins  to  stay  with  her.  And  immedi- 
ately, with  eyes  that  glittered  with  rage.  Miss 
Peabody  commanded:  "Tell  me  how  this  panel 
works." 

With  their  forbidding,  unseeing  or  threaten- 
ing eyes  the  three  men,  the  three  women,  the 
three  children  and  the  baby  on  its  hands  and 
feet  gazed  at  Miss  Peabody.  They  appeared 
immense  and  threatening.  Miss  Jenkins  said 
slowly : 

"You  work  it  by  a  knob  in  the  carved  frame. 
That  is  to  say,  miss,  there  are  two  knobs,  one 


302  RING  FOR  NANCY 

to  shut  it  and  one  to  open  it.  That  was  why 
the  major  couldn^t  shut  it  the  other  night.  He 
got  hold  of  the  one  that  opened  it  first,  and  it 
never  entered  his  head  that  there  was  another 
to  shut  it.  And  then  Miss  Delamare  found  the 
one  to  shut  it,  and  it  never  entered  her  head 
that  there  would  be  another  to  open  it." 

Miss  Peabody  said:  "That  fiendish  woman 
!s  at  the  bottom  of  everything." 

"All  the  same,  miss,"  Miss  Jenkins  said  slow- 
ly, "I  don't  think  if  I  were  you  that  I  should 
:attempt  to  interview  Miss  Delamare  to-night. 
I  should  personally  advise  you  to  let  the  knobs 
alone." 

"I  shall  certainly  do  nothing  of  the  sort," 
Miss  Peabody  said. 

"It  almost  makes  me  inclined  to  say,"  Miss 
Jenkins  replied  slowly,  "your  blood  be  upon 
your  own  head." 

Miss  Peabody  said  sharply:  "That's  a  most 
improper  remark." 

"It  would  be,"  Miss  Jenkins  returned,  "if  it 
were  a  question  merely  of  superior  and  inferior. 
But  you  have  insisted  on  my  joining  in  what 
appears  to  be — in  what  you  consider  to  be — 
a  plot.  And  plotters  have  got  to  be  considered 
equals.  I  don't  think  it  a  proper  thing  that 
you  should  attack  Miss  Delamare.    And  what's 


RING  FOR  NANCY  303 

more,  I  don't  think  it  will  be  a  good  thing  for 
yourself." 

Miss  Peabody  became  calmly  hard  and  ob- 
stinate. 

"My  girl,"  she  said,  "I  don't  know  why  you 
should  be  so  concerned  for  Miss  Delamare.  I 
don't  believe  that  I  can  consider  you  a  friend 
of  mine." 

"I  wish  you  wouldn't  consider  me  a  friend  of 
yours,"  Miss  Jenkins  replied.  "I  am  certainly 
not,  and  it  will  make  your  position  plainer  if 
you  consider  that  I  am  very  decidedly  not  a 
friend  of  yours.  But  it  is  the  most  friendly 
thing  I  have  ever  said  to  you  when  I  recom- 
mend you  to  leave  that  panel  alone/* 

"And  is  it  likely,"  Miss  Peabody  said,  "that 
I  should  take  the  advice  of  a  servant  who  defi- 
nitely tells  me  that  she  is  not  my  friend?"  She 
laughed  again  with  a  high  incredulity.  "Is  it 
really  believable?"  she  said.  "A  servant  who 
is  not  my  friend!" 

Miss  Jenkins  stood  still  with  her  hands  hang- 
ing before  her.  There  was  quite  a  silence,  and 
then  Miss  Peabody  said  sharply:     "Well?" 

"I  have  nothing  in  the  world  to  say,  miss," 
Miss  Jenkins  continued.  "The  position  is  abso- 
lutely at  a  deadlock.  I  have  recommended  you 
very   earnestly   to   leave    the    thing   alone.      It 


304  RING  FOR  NANCY 

doesn*t  appear  to  me  to  be  a  dignified  proceed- 
ing; it  doesn't  appear  to  me  to  be  the  proceed- 
ing of  a  lady,  or  even  of  a  decent-hearted 
woman.  And  if  you  persist  in  doing  it,  all  I 
can  say  is,  that  that  takes  away  any  reluctance 
I  may  feel.  Because,  of  course,  it  makes  me 
all  the  more  absolutely  certain,  if  I  was  not 
certain  enough  already,  that  you  are  absolutely 
unfitted  for  the  position  you  are  called  upon  to 
occupy." 

Miss  Peabody  remained  perfectly  calm.  "I 
don't  in  the  least  understand  your  threats,"  she 
said.  **And  I  don't  in  the  least  want  to  under- 
stand them.  To-morrow  I  shall  deal  with  you. 
.What  do  you  think  your  mistress  will  say  when 
she  hears  of  your  outrageous  insolence  to  a 
guest  of  her  house?" 

"I  think  her  ladyship  will  be  in  entire  agree- 
ment with  me,"   Miss  Jenkins   said. 

"I  don't  believe  anything  of  the  sort,"  Miss 
Peabody  answered.  "You  may  understand  ser- 
vant nature  very  well,  but  it's  pretty  certain 
that  you  don't  understand  the  nature  of  em- 
ployers. You  will  find,  I  think,  that  her  lady- 
ship will  entirely  agree  with  me.  You  will 
find,  I  think,  that  there  is  a  sort  of  freemasonry 
between  employers,  and  that  your  employer, 
hearing  that  you  have  been  insolent  to  another 


RING  FOR  NANCY  305 

person  of  her  class,  will  turn  you  out  of  your 
situation  at  once.  And  I  am  glad  of  it,  for  you 
are  a  more  puffed-up  creature  than  any  one  I 
have  ever  met  in  this  world." 

"Well,  all  I  can  say  is,"  Miss  Jenkins  an- 
swered, "that  if  there  is  that  sort  of  freema- 
sonry between  employers,  and  if  that's  the  sort 
of  thing  that  can  happen  to  a  good  servant 
who  does  what  is  only  her  duty  in  such  circum-^ 
stances  as  I  have  done  my  duty — all  I  can  say 
is,  that  if  that  sort  of  thing  happens,  servants 
are  a  bitterly  wronged  class,  and  I  shall  cer- 
tainly see  to  it  that  my  servants  are  on  a  dif- 
ferent  footing." 

'^Yoiir  servants!"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed. 
"What  have  you  got  to  do  with  servants?" 

"Of  course  I  have  my  servants  like  anybody; 
else,"  Miss  Jenkins  said.  "Do  you  suppose  I 
shouldn't  have?" 

"Then  all  I  can  say  is,"  Miss  Peabody  an- 
swered, "that  the  condition  of  affairs  in  this 
country  is  infinitely  more  corrupt — is  infinitely 
more  revolutionary  than  they  can  be  said  to  be 
even  in  my  own  country.  Heaven  knows  in 
Boston  there's  infinitely  too  little  discipline, 
there's  infinitely  too  little  respect  of  class  for 
class.  But  if  the  sort  of  thing  that  I  find  here 
is  typical  of  your  upper  classes,  if  subordinates 


I 


306  RING  FOR  NANCY 

are  not  only  to  be  treated  as  familiars  by  their 
superiors,  but  to  be  furnished  with  all  the 
luxuries  and  the  privileges  of  their  superiors 
themselves,  how  is  it  to  be  wondered  at  that 
this  branch  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  brotherhood  is 
drifting  to  decay?  I  don't  know  who  you  are, 
and  I  don't  know  what  you  are,  but  it's  quite 
evident  to  me  that  you  must  have  some  hold 
over  your  mistress.  Probably  the  origin  of 
that  hold  is  in  something  corrupt.  Almost  cer- 
tainly it  is,  and  that's  the  end  of  the  whole  mat- 
ter. Everywhere  here  I  find  corruption,  and 
corruption,  and  again  corruption." 

"I'm  sure  that's  extremely  interesting,"  Miss 
Jenkins  said.  "But  if  you  will  kindly  give  me 
any  further  orders  that  you  may  have,  I  shall 
be  pleased  to  take  them.  Or  if  not  I  shall  be 
glad  to  be  dismissed." 

"I  order  you,"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed,  "to 
reveal  to  me  the  secret  of  that  panel." 

Miss  Jenkins  produced  a  very  small  stamp- 
case  of  green  leather  from  the  pocket  of  her 
apron.  She  opened  it  and  took  out  a  little 
piece  of  stamp-paper;  and,  coming  toward  the 
frame  of  the  immense  picture  panel,  she  stuck 
the  little  piece  of  stamp-paper  on  a  protruding 
knob. 

"That,"  she  said,  "is  the  knob  that  opens  the 


RING  FOR  NANCY  307 

panel.  You  ordered  me  to  show  it  you,  and 
I  have  shown  it  to  you  much  against  my  will." 

"But  where,"  Miss  Peabody  asked,  "is  the 
knob  that  closes  the  panel?" 

"That,"  Miss  Jenkins  exclaimed,  "I  shall  cer- 
tainly not  show  you.  You  insist  on  opening 
that  panel  in  order  to  give  Miss  Delamare  what 
you  would  probably  call  a  piece  of  your  mind. 
And  as  you  will  probably  give  an  untruthful 
account  of  the  transaction  to-morrow,  I  am 
perfectly  determined  that,  if  the  panel  is  opened, 
it  shall  remain  open  as  evidence  of  the  fact 
that  it  was  you  who  opened  it.  The  panel  can 
not  be  opened  frohi  the  next  room,  so  that 
proof  is  absolutely  conclusive. 

"And,  indeed,"  she  continued,  "I  tell  you 
plainly,  that  I  shall  go  straight  from  here  and 
throw  the  closing  gear  of  that  panel  out  of 
action.  So  that  if  you  open  it,  you  certainly 
will  not  be  able  to  close  it  even  though  you 
should  find  the  other  knob." 

Miss  Peabody  said  with  a  sort  of  high  irony: 
"Well,  this  is  a  pretty  condition  of  affairs,  I'm 
sure." 

"Her  ladyship,"  Miss  Jenkins  replied,  "left 
me  here  to  act  upon  my  own  discretion  for  the 
protection  of  her  friends  in  this  house  and  of 
the  reputation  of  the  house  itself.    I  don't  want 


308  RING  FOR  NANCY 

to  have  scenes  here,  and  I  won't  have  scenes 
here.  But  as  it  is  obviously  impossible  for  me 
to  stop  you  making  a  fool  of  yourself,  I  certain- 
ly insist  upon  your  making  a  fool  of  yourself 
in  my  own  way — in  the  way  that  is  least  likely 
to  cause  inconvenience  to  her  ladyship,  or  to 
any  other  person  in  this  house.  And  as  for 
Miss  Delamare,  if  you  attack  her,  I  don't  think, 
knowing  her  as  I  do,  that  you  will  get  very 
much  change  out  of  her."  I 

"I  fail  to  understand  these  vulgar  expres- 
sions," Miss  Peabody  said. 

**Not  to  get  much  change  out  of  a  person,'* 
Miss  Jenkins  replied,  with  the  utmost  equa- 
nimity, "is  an  Americanism.  It  means  that  you 
come  off  second  best.  It  means  that  Miss 
Delamare's  case  is  so  absolutely  impregnable, 
that  you  won't  be  able  even  to  make  her  wince 
and  that  she  will  make  you  wince  all  the  time." 

"Everything  you  say,"  Miss  Peabody  said, 
"only  makes  me  all  the  more  determined  to  do 
what  I  am  determined  to  do." 

"I  am  quite  aware  of  that,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said.  "It's  a  little  proceeding  which  will  lead 
you  to  disaster,  and  I  don't  see  that  I  am  par- 
ticularly concerned  in  saving  you  from  disaster. 
I  am  concerned  in  satisfying  my  own  con- 
science.    If  you  come  to  grief  I  shall  probably 


RING  FOR  NANCY  309 

profit  by  it,  so  I  am  not  going  to  let  you  come 
to  grief  until  I  have  used  every  possible  argu- 
ment that  would  dissuade  a  decent  woman. 
For  the  main  point  for  me  is  that  if  you  are 
not  a  decent  woman,  I  have  every  possible  right 
to  profit  by  your  collapse.'* 

Miss  Peabody,  still  ironically,  exclaimed: 
"What  language!" 

"Yes,  collapse,"  Miss  Jenkins  said  gravely. 
"That's  what  you  will  do.  If  you  indulge  in 
this  vicious  and  vulgar  spite  you  will  collapse. 
You  will  collapse  utterly.  You  will  go  out.  I 
warn  you  that  you  will  go  out,  and  you  will 
probably  be  miserable  to  the  end  of  your  days. 
And  you  will  deserve  it.  For  what  has  Miss 
Delamare  done  to  you?  Nothing!  Absolutely 
nothing!  It's  just  because  she's  little  and  gen- 
tle and  pretty  and  gay  and  nice — and  to  be  sure 
you're  none  of  those  things — and  it's  just  be- 
cause she's  been  kind  to  another  old  woman — 
kind  and  gentle  and  considerate — and  to  be 
sure  you're  none  of  those  things  either.  But 
it's  just  because  of  them  that  you  hate  her  as 
an  unpleasant  cat  hates  a  pleasant  dog.  It 
isn't  because — it  isn't  because  you're  my  rival 
that  I  hope  to  see  you  thrown  out  of  this  house. 

"If  you  had  been  a  nice  woman,  heaven  knows 
I  wouldn't  have   stirred  a  finger  against  you. 


310  RING  FOR  NANCY 

heaven  really  knows  that  I  wouldn't.  But  you 
have  such  an  evil  nature!  You  have  such  a 
dislike  of  anything  that  is  good  and  gay  and 
pleasant,  that  even  though  I  don't  want  to  do 
so  for  my  own  sake,  I  shall  certainly  do  for 
his — the  very  best  that  I  possibly  can  to  save 
from  you  the  man  whom  I  have  loved  for  years, 
and  a  man  who  is  as  good  and  as  gentle  and  as 
gay  as  any  man  ever  was  in  this  world.  So  I 
tell  you  quite  plainly  that,  if  you  attempt  to  in- 
terfere with  Miss  Delamare,  you  will  lose  the 
man  you  are  engaged  to.  I  hope  you  will  do 
it  and  I  hope  you  may  lose  him,  for  if  you  do 
I  shall  most  certainly  get  him,  and  I  want  him 
more  than  anything  else  in  the  world;  and 
that's  just  all  there  is  to  it,  and  this  is  the 
last  word  that  I  shall  say.  I've  just  planked 
my  cards  on  the  table  and  you  can  do  as  you 
like." 

Miss  Peabody  remained  gazing  at  her  for  a 
long  minute  in  an  absolute  speechlessness,  and 
Miss  Jenkins  was  just  moving  toward  the  door 
when  she  exclaimed  sharply: 

"No,  stop!  You!"  She  put  her  hand  up  to 
her  forehead.  "So  that,"  she  said  at  last,  "you 
are  in  league  with  that  creature.  With  that 
Miss  Delamare.  And  you  are  trying  to  shield 
her.     That's  it!     I  see  through  the  whole  dis- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  311 

creditable  and  disgusting  thing.  I'm  not  going 
to  speak  about  it  any  more.  I  shall  attend  to 
the  matter  to-morrow.  But  to-night  I  shall 
speak  to  this  woman  in  such  a  way  as  to  drive 
her  right  out  of  this  house.  You  may  hope 
that  I  can't  do  this,  but  I  certainly  can.  I 
have  had  to  do  with  too  many  abandoned  and 
fallen  women  in  my  life  not  to  let  my  tongue 
be  like  the  whip  of  a  lash.  And  I  begin  to  see 
so  far  into  this  disgusting  and  sordid  affair  that 
in  a  few  minutes  I  shall  be  absolutely  at  the 
bottom  of  it,  and  then  I  shall  be  prepared  to 
act.  But  as  for  your  imagining  that  Major 
Foster  will  ever  fall  to  you,  I  tell  you  this,  that 
if  God  struck  me  with  lightning  at  this  minute 
and  you  were  the  only  woman  in  the  world,  he 
would  never  look  at  you.     Now  you  may  go." 

Miss  Jenkins  withdrew  without  another  word. 

And  Miss  Peabody  remained  alone,  leaning 
on  the  high  mantelpiece  and  really  trying  to 
get  to  the  bottom  of  things.  And  then  sud- 
denly the  bottom  of  things  came  up  at  her  like 
a  flash.  It  was  really  the  plainest  intrigue  that 
she  had  ever  been  called  upon  to  solve.  Miss 
Delamare  was  to  plunder  Mr.  Foster,  and  she 
had  agreed  upon  this  with  her  ladyship's  own 
maid,  giving  the  major  himself  over  to  Miss 
Jenkins   as   the   price   of   Miss  Jenkins'    support! 


312  RING  FOR  NANCY 

There  simply  could  not  be  any  doubt  about 
this.  And  with  a  step  of  extreme  firmness, 
she  marched  straight  over  toward  the  panel. 
She  was  just  going  to  tell  Miss  Delamare  that 
she  had  unshakable  proof  that  she  was  Mr. 
Foster's  mistress,  and  that  the  granting  of  the 
lease  of  the  new  theater  was  the  price  of  her 
sin. 


VI 

MR.  FOSTER  was  sitting  in  front  of  his 
bedroom  fire  in  a  state  of  the  most 
thorough  dispiritude.  He  did  not  Hke  his 
room,  which  was  hung  all  with  pink  chintz 
;and  did  not  seem  to  be  the  proper  room  for  a 
gentleman;  he  was  exceedingly  afraid  of  what 
he  saw  to  be  the  considerable  change  in  Mrs. 
Foster,  and  he  was  extremely  afraid  of  what 
Miss  Peabody  might  be  going  to  do  or,  still 
more,  to  say,  now  that  he  had  definitely  signed 
with  Miss  Delamare  the  agreement  for  the  new 
theater.  His  simple  soul  was  thoroughly  fright- 
ened, thoroughly  worried  and  thoroughly; 
shaken. 

For  nearly  an  hour  he  had  been  trying 
to  read  a  book  by  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  called 
Pink  Passions.  This  book  troubled  him  exceed- 
ingly; for,  to  tell  the  truth,  he  had  never  read 
a  book  since  the  publication  of  The  Woman  in 
White.  And  it  did  not  seem  to  him  to  be  nat- 
ural that  people  should  behave  as  they  did  in 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe's  book,  and  the  characters 
certainly  seemed  to  him  to  be  chiefly  improper 

313 


314  RING  FOR  NANCY 

persons.  On  the  other  hand,  Mrs.  Foster  was 
perpetually  dinning  into  him  the  fact  that  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  was  a  great  author.  And  in  his 
muddled  and  troubled  state,  the  poor  man  be- 
gan reflecting  upon  what  was  to  be  expected 
from  great  authors.  He  had  a  vague  idea  that 
the  purpose  of  literature  was  said  to  be  to 
ennoble  the  world;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  he 
had  an  idea  that  the  end  of  authors,  or  the  life 
of  authors  for  the  matter  of  that,  was  spent  in 
the  divorce  courts.  And  he  imagined  that  the 
greater  the  author,  the  more  frequent  were  his 
visits  to  these  establishments.  So  that  he  could 
not  very  well  see  how  the  products  of  obvious- 
ly immoral  persons  could  help  on  moral  causes 
in  the  world. 

And  at  the  same  time  he  was  so  anxious 
to  be  received  back,  if  not  into  his  old  quar- 
ters, at  least  into  Mrs.  Foster's  favor,  that 
he  was  really  desperately  anxious  to  appre- 
ciate not  only  Miss  Delamare,  but  also  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe.  He  felt  that  if  he  could  do  this, 
Mrs.  Foster  would,  for  reasons  that  he  could 
not  understand,  be  kind  to  him  again.  And  he 
was  looking  into  his  fire  and  brooding  rather 
miserably.  For  he  was  determined  to  await 
the  return  of  Mrs.  Foster  before  he  got  into 
bed.    He  wished  to  tell  her  as  well  as  he  could 


RING  FOR  NANCY  315 

that,  in  the  end,  he  found  that  she  was  more 
important  to  him  than  the  wishes  of  Miss  Pea- 
body. 

Though  this  again  muddled  him,  for  he 
had  really  wanted  to  propitiate  his  wife  by  do- 
ing everything  that  he  possibly  could  to  please 
her  nephew.  And  he  had  perfectly  believed 
that,  the  more  he  pleased  Miss  Peabody,  the 
more  joy  it  ought  to  cause  Major  Edward 
Brent  Foster;  for  so  simple  was  his  soul  that 
it  had  never  occurred  to  him  to  notice  that  his 
wife  exceedingly  detested  that  lady.  He  had 
usually  been  taught  by  his  friends  in  the  city, 
and  other  places,  to  consider  that  women  were 
incomprehensible,  but  he  had  really  had  so 
little  to  do  with  women — though  it  is  true  that 
having  been  as  normally  unfaithful  to  Mrs. 
Foster  as  most  of  his  friends  were  to  their 
wives,  he  had  now  and  then  had  his  whiskers 
damaged  before  he  shaved  them  in  order  to  be 
more  in  the  fashion — he  had  really  had  so  little 
to  do  with  women,  that  the  fact  they  were  in- 
comprehensible had  not  really  seemed  to  him 
to  matter  at  all. 

But  now  he  dropped  Pink  Passions,  and  look- 
ing at  the  fire,  exclaimed  in  a  bitterly  aggrieved 
tone:     "Why,  they're  incomprehensible!" 

He  had  been  trying  to  do  his  best  to  please 


316  RING  FOR  NANCY 

everybody  all  round,  and  he  seemed  to  have 
come  in  for  so  much  abuse,  that  he  simply  felt 
bruised  and  black  and  blue  all  over  his  moral 
being. 

"JVhy,  they're  incomprehensible!"  he  repeat- 
ed. For,  if  Mr.  Foster  had  not  been  strictly 
virtuous  all  his  life,  he  had  certainly  been 
strictly  respectable,  and  in  the  present  transac-  . 
tions,  he  had  not  only  been  extremely  respecta-  | 
ble  but  even  quite  absolutely  virtuous.  There 
was  not,  he  was  perfectly  certain,  a  single  thing 
that  could  possibly  be  said  against  his  virtue. 
Not  a  single  thing.  He  was  as  spotless  as  an 
angel,  and  he  tried  to  be  as  obliging  as  a 
Cook's  Guide. 

He  heard  a  little  swish — a  negligible  sound 
in  these  old  houses — and  suddenly  there  burst 
upon  him  the  words: 

"You  infamous  man!  You  abandoned 
woman !" 

Mr.  Foster  tried  to  spring  clean  out  of  his 
chair;  but  since  he  was  not  normally  very  ac- 
tive, he  only  succeeded  in  achieving  a  sort  of 
shuffle.  Miss  Peabody  was  standing  in  a  sort 
of  lighted  square  that  had  disappeared  from 
the  pink  chintzed  paneling  of  one  of  his  walls. 
And  his  mind  having  been  running  upon  his 
respectable  but  not  impeccable  past,  Mr.  Fos- 


RING  FOR  NANCY  317 

;  ter  imagined  that  Miss  Peabody  must  have 
heard  what  he  would  have  called  a  thing  or 
two  about  himself,  and  exclaimed  in  a  breath- 
less alarm:     "What  woman?" 

And  then  there  began  a  breathless  dialogue, 
for  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed:  *'That  actress — 
that  Miss  Delamare!     I  know  all  about  her." 

Mr.  Foster  ejaculated:     "What  about  her?" 

And  Miss  Peabody  said  convictingly:  "You 
are  in  her  room." 

"Certainly  not,"  Mr.  Foster  almost  screamed. 
"This  is  my  room." 

"You  can't  expect  me  to  believe  that,"  she 
said. 

"Oh,  nonsense!"  he  answered.  "You've  gone 
mad  with  jealousy." 

Olympia  advanced  upon  him.  "Mr.  Foster," 
she  exclaimed  with  a  fixed  gravity,  "don't  lie 
to  me.  I  expected  to  find  you  here.  I  was 
convinced  that  I  should  find  you  here,  and  I 
have  found  you  here.  There's  no  getting  away 
from  that.  If  you  like  to  behave  penitently,  I 
may  be  inclined  to  conceal  your  guilt.  But  I 
insist  upon  your  leaving  that  atrocious  woman 
to  me.  I  insist  upon  your  at  once  leaving  this 
room." 

"But  damn  it!"  Mr.  Foster  said,  and  it  was 
the  first  time  he  had  ever  sworn  in  his  hfe,  "I 


318  RING  FOR  NANCY 

must  have  some  room  somewhere.  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter has  turned  me  out  of  my  room,  and  Fm 
certainly  not  going  to  let  you  turn  me  out  of 
this." 

Miss  Peabody  repeated  stonily:  "I  insist  up- 
on your  leaving  that  atrocious  woman  to  me." 

"But  there's  no  woman  here  but  yourself,  my 
good  soul,"  Mr.  Foster  said.  "You  can  see  that 
there  isn't." 

Miss  Peabody  exclaimed:  "Nonsense!  She's 
hiding  behind  the  curtains.  She's  got  under  the 
bed." 

Mr.  Foster  ejaculated:  "By  heaven!  Women 
are  incomprehensible!  You're  out  of  your 
senses.  It's  a  most  extraordinary  mistake." 
And  after  a  moment  he  added:  "Come  and 
look  behind  the  curtains.  Get  under  the  bed 
yourself  if  you  want  to.     I'm  sick  of  all  this." 

Miss  Peabody  advanced  right  into  the  room. 
She  did  look  behind  the  curtains,  and  she  satis- 
fied herself  that  the  bed  came  so  low  that  no- 
body could  possibly  get  under  it. 

And  Mr.  Foster  by  this  time  had  become  so 
furiously  enraged,  that  he  began  to  run  about 
the  room  throwing  open  the  wardrobes,  the 
drawers  and  even  the  cover  of  his  dressing-table. 

"Look  here,  you  infernal  idiot,"  he  said; 
"there  you  can  see  my  suits.     And  there  you 


Mr.  Footer  let  go  of  Miss   Peabody  altogether 


RING  FOR  NANCY  319 

can  see  my  vests  and  pants.  And  there  you 
can  see  my  spare  studs  and  my  shaving  things. 
Does  that  satisfy  you?  Miss  Delamare  doesn't 
shave." 

Miss  Peabody  stood  for  a  terrified  moment 
v^ith  her  eyes  so  distended  that  he  thought  she 
v^ould  burst  the  lids. 

"Then  it's  your  room!"  she  exclaimed.  "How 
horrible!"  She  caught  her  breath  sharply. 
"My  dear  man,"  she  exclaimed,  "my  dear 
friend,  how  can  I  have  wronged  you!"  Her 
brain  began  to  swim  and  she  made  desperate 
and  even  exaggerated  efforts  to  get  back  to  the 
courtly  and  old-fashioned  phraseology  that  she 
had  always  used  when  speaking  to  Mr.  Foster. 
"My  good  friend,"  she  repeated,  "my  dear 
friend!  My  dear,  dear  friend!"  And  then,  as 
she  felt  really  faint,  she  said:  "Support  me! 
You  are  so  strong!  So  noble!  Lay  me  on  my 
bed."  And  as  she  actually  did  totter,  Mr.  Fos- 
ter could  not  see  anything  for  it  but  to  try  and 
support  her  back  into  her  own  room.  He  really 
did  try,  too,  to  carry  her,  but,  as  she  was  no 
light  weight,  he  hardly  succeeded  in  doing  more 
than  make  her  stumble  along  the  floor.  And 
then  he  perceived  Mrs.  Foster  standing  in  the 
square  opening.  She  exclaimed,  in  what  he 
knew  to  be  tones  of  the  deepest  contempt: 


320  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Mr.  Foster!     Miss  Peabody!'* 

And  this  affected  Mr.  Foster  so  much  that  he 
let  go  of  Miss  Peabody  altogether.  She  col- 
lapsed upon  the  floor  like  a  badly  jointed  doll 
and  gave  just  one,  but  a  very  violent  scream. 
Mr.  Foster  stood  perfectly  still  with  his  jaw 
hanging  down,  and  then  Mrs.  Foster  said 
slowly : 

"I  presume  you  will  explain  what  this  means. 
Or  don't  you  intend  to?'*  j 

Mr.  Foster  began  to  giggle  feebly.  " 

"My  dear,"  he  said,  "I  don't  know.  I  don't 
know  what  it  means.  Miss  Peabody  came  into 
my  room  suddenly."  | 

Mrs.  Foster  said  simply:  "So  it  appears"; 
and  Miss  Peabody  remarked  faintly  from  the 
floor:     "Mrs.  Foster!" 

Then,  suddenly,  Mrs.  Foster  appeared  to  be- 
come enraged.  She  rushed  up  to  Miss  Pea- 
body, and  leaning  over  her  exclaimed: 

"Don't  speak!  Don't  you  dare  to  speak,  or 
I  shall  spurn  your  abandoned  face  with  my 
foot." 

Mr.  Foster  tried  to  get  in  a  "But,  my  dear 
.  .  ."  but  Mrs.  Foster,  who  was  perfectly  white 
with  rage,  exclaimed: 

"Hold  your  tongue!"  And  then  she  added: 
"This  is  what  it  means!    This  is  what  it  has  all 


•RING  FOR  NANCY  321 

meant.  This  is  the  meaning  of  your  compli- 
ments to  that — that  thing.  This  is  why  I  have 
been  thrown  into  the  society  of  this  woman 
that  I  always  detested.  This  is  why  my  poor 
Edward  must  marry  her — to  cover  up  an 
abominable  intrigue.  .  .  ." 

And  then  suddenly  Miss  Delamare  and  Mrs. 
Kerr  Howe  appeared  in  the  room  behind. 

*Tn  the  name  of  heaven  what's  the  matter?" 
Mrs.  Kerr  Howe  said.  "Who's  that  scream- 
ing?'* And  they  both  stood  in  the  opening  of 
the  panel  with  wide  and  incredulous  eyes. 

Mrs.  Foster  turned  upon  them  with  an  im- 
mense dignity. 

"This  is  the  matter,"  she  exclaimed.  "I  have 
discovered  that  that  woman  on  the  floor  is  the 
basest  of  mortals.     That  she  and  my  husband 

"But  that  isn't  possible,"  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe 
said. 

Mrs.  Foster  answered:  "But  I  tell  you  I 
saw  it  with  my  own  eyes.  Mr.  Foster  was  car- 
rying this  woman  in  his  arms.  She  had  her 
arms  round  his  neck." 

"Oh,  I  can't  beheve  that,"  Miss  Delamare 
said. 

Mrs.  Foster  was  beginning  again:  "She 
had  her  arms  round  his  neck.    I  heard  her  with 


322  RING  FOR  NANCY 

my  own  ears  ask  him  to  carry  her  to  her  bed. 
This  is  philanthropy!  This  is  the  suppression 
of  vice!  And  to  think  that  it  should  be  my 
husband — and  to  think  that  she's  such  a  thing! 
She's — she's  old!  Her  teeth  are  false,  her 
hair's  false.  I  know  it  is.  I've  seen  it  hanging 
over  her  looking-glass." 

Miss  Peabody  began  to  scream  lamentably, 
but  Mrs.   Foster  continued  without  pity: 

"My  dear,  if  he  had  wanted  to  betray  me 
with  you,  I  shouldn't  mind  so  much.  You're 
young  and  pretty  and  charming,  and  you've  got 
a  nice  heart  and  gay  manners.  Or  if  it  had 
been  you,  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  it  wouldn't  have 
been  so  insulting.  You've  got  good  looks, 
though  you're  too  little  to  be  really  handsome, 
and  you  dress  well.  And  you  have  got  an  intel- 
lect. But  that  it  should  be  that  thing — she's 
as  old  as  myself  or  older,  and  she  dresses  out 
of  the  rag-bag,  and  she's  wizened  and  she's  spite- 
ful and  she's  stupid  .  .  ." 

She  was  interrupted  by  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  who 
remarked: 

"Mrs.  Foster,  there's  somebody  knocking  at 
the  door."  And  a  deep  silence  fell  upon  them. 
They  heard  the  voice  of  Major  Brent  Foster 
exclaim  clearly  from  within: 

"Olympia,  may  I  come  in?  They  say  they've 
changed  our  rooms." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  323 

And  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed:  "Oh,  come  in 
and  look  at  this  disgraceful  spectacle." 

The  major  came  in,  with  his  amiable  smile 
which  gradually  changed  into  an  appalled  ex- 
pression. 

"Why,  what!"  he  ejaculated.  "Olympia  on 
the  floor!  Why,  whatever!  .  .  .  Olympia,  get 
up.     I've  bought  you  this  ring  in  town." 

And  he  was  crossing  the  room  to  go  to 
Olympiads  side,  when  Mrs.  Foster  stretched 
her  arm  rigidly  across  his  chest.  "My  dear," 
she  said,  "come  away.  You  can't  stop  here  any 
longer." 

"But  what's  the  matter?"  he  asked. 

"We  must  go  aw^ay,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "You 
and  I  and  Flossie — out  of  this  house  for  good." 

"But  hang  it  all!"  the  major  said.  "I  must 
have  some  sort  of  an  explanation.  You  can't 
clear  out  of  the  house  as  if  you  were  taking  a 
twopenny  ticket  on  the  tube.  What's  the  mat- 
ter,  Olympia?" 

But  Mrs.  Foster  said  quite  harshly:  "Ed- 
ward!    No,  don't  speak  to  that — that — harlot." 

It  was  at  this  word  that  Miss  Peabody  began 
to  scream  again,  and  she  screamed  quite  re- 
spectably for  some  minutes.  And  then  they 
perceived  that  Miss  Jenkins  was  coming  into 
the  room  from  behind  the  hangings.  She 
pushed    them    aside    and    stood    among    them, 


324  RING  FOR  NANCY 

rather  rigidly,  looking  down  at  Miss  Peabody, 
her  lower  lip  just  curling  in  the  very  slightest. 

"I  told  you!"  she  said  in  the  lowest  of  voices. 

The  major  became  pale  when  he  looked  at 
her.  She  was  in  what  Mrs.  Foster  called  a 
roofed-in  dress  of  dark  blue  silk. 

*'My  God!"  he  ejaculated.  "You  here!  I 
insist  upon  some  explanation." 

But  Mrs.  Foster  exclaimed:  "No,  no,  my 
dear,  not  now.  We  must  go  away.  I  couldn't 
explain  here.  You  would  kill  your  uncle.  Fm 
afraid  it  would  be  your  duty  to  kill  your  uncle." 

The  major  exclaimed:  "Good  God!  Kill  my 
uncle!     What's  the  meaning  of  all  this?" 

Miss  Peabody  got  up  from  the  ground.  "Ed- 
ward," she  said,  "I  shall  explain  to  you  and  to 
no  one  else." 

"Well,  I  certainly  think,"  the  major  com- 
mented, "that  somebody  ought  to  explain  to 
some   one." 

"Then  I  shall  explain  to  no  one  at  all,"  Miss 
Peabody  said.  "I  shall  leave  this  house  at 
once." 

"I  should  certainly  advise  you,"  Miss  Jenkins 
said  slowly,  "to  give  an  entire  explanation  of 
everything.  I  believe,  miss,  that  you  are  per- 
fectly innocent." 

Miss   Peabody  looked   at   Miss  Jenkins,   and 


RING  FOR  NANCY  325 

her  lips  almost  silently  let  fall  the  one  word, 
"Devil!"  Then  she  turned  upon  Major  Foster. 
"There's  no  need  of  explanation,"  she  said. 

But  Miss  Jenkins  exclaimed  with  her  level 
intonation:  "I  don't  know  so  much  about  that, 
Miss  Peabody.  You  see,  the  other  night  you 
said  that  things  didn't  look  so  innocent.  And 
yet  the  other  night  .  .  ." 

Mrs.  Foster  said:  "What's  that  about  the 
other  night?"  with  the  sharpness  of  a  cross- 
examining  barrister. 

"It  w^as  a  most  infamous  scene,"  Miss  Pea- 
body  said.  "There  were  all  these  women  run- 
ning after  that  fool  of  a  nephew  of  yours." 

"Oh,  I  say!"  the  major  exclaimed.  "What 
have  /  done,  Olympia?" 

Miss  Peabody  turned  upon  him  with  an  ex- 
traordinary fierceness.  "If  you  had  had  the 
spirit  of  a  man,"  she  said,  "you  would  have 
struck  your  aunt  dead  at  my  feet." 

"Oh,  come,  Olympia,"  the  major  said.  "Kill 
my  aunt  as  well  as  my  uncle?  I  should  be  an 
orphan." 

"You  would  have  struck  your  aunt  dead  at 
your  feet,"  Aliss  Peabody  repeated,  "before  you 
would  have  let  her  utter  the  abominable  insults 
she  has  poured  on  me." 

"But  I  haven't  heard  any  of  the  insults,"  the 


326  RING  FOR  NANCY 

major  said  amiably.  "She  must  have  poured 
them  out  before  I  came  in." 

"She  didn't  say  a  single  word  that  was  not 
true,"  Miss  Delamare  exclaimed.  "Not  a  sin- 
gle word." 

"You  hear  her?"  Miss  Peabody  exclaimed  to 
the  major.  "You  hear  her,  and  you  don't  strike 
her  to  the  ground  at  once!" 

"Oh,  I  say,  Olympia,"  the  major  said.  "You 
want  a  town  butcher  for  this  job." 

Miss  Peabody  was  by  now  enraged  past  bear- 
ing. And  her  face  as  she  looked  toward  the 
major  trembled  visibly. 

"You  utter  imbecile!"  she  said.  "You  grin- 
ning amiable  fool.  It's  disgusting  to  me  that  I 
ever  saw  your  face,  and  it  will  disgust  me  so 
that  I  shall  be  ill  if  I  ever  see  your  face  again. 
This  is  a  house  of  madmen  and  fools  and  of 
corruption.  I  leave  this  house  at  once.  Send 
for  my  maid  to  take  away  my  things.  I  shall 
give  no  explanation;  I  shall  go:  for  this  house 
is  Sodom  and  Gomorrah."  And  suddenly  she 
pulled  off  her  engagement  ring  and  threw  it  at 
the  major's  feet.  "My  own  car,"  she  continued, 
"will  take  me  to  town  at  once.  I  say  good 
night  to  nobody;  I  say  good-by  to  nobody.  I 
only  hope  that  all  your  sins  may  be  rewarded 
as  they  deserve." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  327 

And  suddenly  they  perceived  that  Miss  Pea- 
body  was  just  gone.  They  had  all  been  think- 
ing so  hard  along  one  train  of  thought  or  the 
other  that  it  was  almost  as  if  she  had  vanished 
into  the  ground.     The  major  exclaimed: 

"Oh,  I  say!  We  can't  let  the  poor  woman 
go  off  like  that."  And  he  made  a  movement 
toward  the  door.  But  Mrs.  Foster  caught  him 
fiercely  by  the  hand. 

"Edward,"  she  said,  "if  you  go  after  that 
woman,  I  shall  pray  God  to  strike  you  dead  at 
my  feet." 

"Oh,  come,"  the  major  said,  "you  wouldn't 
do  that." 

They  all  stood  about  awkwardly;  there  sim- 
ply was  not  any  one  there  who  had  a  word  to 
say,  it  seemed  to  have  grown  so  extraordinarily 
quiet  with  the  absence  of  Miss  Peabody.  It 
was  as  if  a  tempest  had  suddenly  died  away 
and  left  them  listening  for  departing  gusts. 
And  then  suddenly  Miss  Peabody's  maid  ap- 
peared in  the  room  that  had  been  Miss  Pea- 
body's,  and  without  a  word,  she  began  pack- 
ing Miss  Peabody's  trunks.  In  a  sort  of  bewil- 
dered silence  they  all  of  them  began  to  help 
her.  Miss  Jenkins  was  the  first  to  do  this,  and 
then  Mrs.  Kerr  Howe,  and  then  Miss  Dela- 
mare.     The  girl  was  gone  in  an  astonishingly 


328  RING  FOR  NANCY 

short  space  of  time,  and  still  they  all  hung 
about,  for  every  one  of  them  felt  that  he  or  she 
had  something  remarkable  to  say.  But  no- 
body said  anything;  only  at  last  Miss  Jenkins 
remarked: 

"I  think.  Major  Edward,  if  you  would  help 
me  to  bring  some  of  your  things  here  it  would 
be  just  as  well.  I  don't  suppose  Mrs.  Foster 
would  want  the  servants  to  know  anything 
more  than  they  need  know." 

Nobody  said  anything,  for  Mrs.  Foster  was 
beginning  just  slightly  to  whimper. 

"And  if,"  Miss  Jenkins  continued,  "Mrs.  Kerr 
Howe  and  Miss  Delamare  will  go  to  bed,  it 
might  make  things  all  the  quieter.  I'm  certain 
Mrs.  Foster  is  wanting  a  quiet  word  with  her 
husband." 

And  slowly,  under  Miss  Jenkins's  direction, 
they  all  dissolved,  until  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Foster 
were  left  standing  there  alone. 


lVII 

A  ND  suddenly,  since  she  no  longer  had  the 
-^  ^  stimulating  presence  of  Olympia  to  stiffen 
her  into  hostility,  Mrs.  Foster  burst  into  tears 
and  exclaimed:     "How  could  you,  Arthur!" 

Mr.  Foster  did  the  best  that  he  could  with 
several  sentences  beginning  with  the  words, 
"But,  my  dear  .  .  ."  He  could  not,  however, 
finish  any  of  them.  And  then  Mrs.  Foster  be- 
gan to  speak  with  a  real  and  quite  touching; 
mournfulness. 

"Again  I  have  got  to  say,"  she  exclaimed, 
"how  could  you,  Arthur!  For  although  I  have 
known  for  years  that  you  haven't  been  a  good 
husband  to  me  in  that  sort  of  way,  it  didn't 
seem  somehow  to  matter  to  me.  I  know  I 
ought  to  have  been  enraged;  I  know  it  is  highly 
improper  of  me — it's  probably  not  even  virtuous 
of  me — not  to  have  made  frightful  scenes.  I 
suppose  I  ought  to  have  cared,  but  I  simply 
did  not  see  how  I  could  care.  I've  sat  up  in 
bed  at  night  trying  to  shake  myself  into  rages, 
but  I  just  couldn't.  But  when  it  comes  to  this 
— this  is  so  unnatural — this  is  so  horrible." 

329 


330  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"But  I'm  damned,"  Mr.  Foster  said,  "if  I 
understand  what  this  is!  I  know  I  ought  not 
to  swear,  but  I  simply  can't  help  it.  What's 
it  all  about?     What  is  thisf  .  .  ." 

Mrs.  Foster  contented  herself  with  remark- 
ing still  more  mournfully:  "How  could  you! 
How  could  you!" 

"But  hang  and  confound  you,"  her  husband 
exclaimed,  "I  couldn't!  I  didn't  do  anything; 
I  don't  know  what  it's  all  about." 

"But  she  was  in  your  room,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said. 

"She  was,"  her  husband  answered;  "but  I 
can't  help  that.  I  don't  know  what  happened. 
I  had  been  reading  a  book,  and  suddenly  the 
wall  opened  and  then  she  came  in  and  accused 
me  of  having  Miss  Delamare  concealed  there. 
She  came  in  to  search  the  room." 

A  new  anger  overwhelmed  Mrs.  Foster. 

"What  business,"  she  exclaimed,  "what  busi- 
ness was  it  of  that  woman  to  search  your  room 
— unless  you  had  given  her  a  right  to  be  jeal- 
ous?    Why  did  you  let  her?" 

"My  dear,"  Mr.  Foster  said,  "how  in  the 
world  could  I  stop  her?  She  was  like  a  sort  of 
policeman  over  me.  You  know  she  was  like  a 
sort  of  policeman  over  me." 

"Yet,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "I  found  you  carry- 
ing her." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  331 

"She  was  fainting,"  Mr.  Foster  replied  in  self- 
defense. 

"It  doesn't  matter  whether  she  was  fainting 
or  not,"  his  wife  said.  "If  you  could  have  car- 
ried her  out,  you  could  have  stopped  her  com- 
ing in — a  great  strong  man  like  you.  No,  I 
am  convinced  of  it,  you  had  arranged  with  her 
beforehand  to  press  that  knob  and  open  that 
panel." 

Mr.  Foster  said  bewilderedly:  "What  pan- 
el? .What  panel?"  And  when  his  wife  had 
explained  he  seized  his  advantage  quickly,  and 
with  a  quite  virtuous  indignation,  he  said: 

''You  knew  about  that  panel.  I  didn't.  You 
changed  my  room.  I  didn't.  It's  you  who  are 
to  blame;  I  am  certainly  not.  I  was  as  obedi- 
ent as  any  husband  ought  to  be.  I  was  trying 
to  read  a  book  you  told  me  to  read  in  a  room 
you  told  me  to  be  in,  and  suddenly — I'm 
hanged  if  it  didn't  feel  as  if  all  the  pots  from 
the  side  of  a  grocer's  shop  fell  on  my  head  at 
once.     It  was  all  entirely  your  fault." 

"It's  no  good  your  trying  to  get  out  of  it 
like  that,  Arthur,"  Mrs.  Foster  said. 

"But  I  am  going  to  get  out  of  it  like  that," 
her  husband  answered  energetically.  "I've  had 
too  much  of  it;  I'm  going  to  take  a  stand.  Not 
only  did  you  put  me  in  this  room,  but  you  put 
that  woman  in  that  other  room." 


332  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"I  certainly  didn't,"  she  answered.  "It  was 
Teddy's  room,  and  it  has  always  been  Teddy's 
room." 

"That's  all  nonsense,"  Mr.  Foster  said. 
"You're  the  mistress  of  this  house.  It's  your 
business  to  arrange  people's  rooms." 

"But  that's  just  the  whole  thing,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter said.  "I've  never  been  the  mistress  of  this 
house.  That's  been  the  whole  cause  of  com- 
plaint with  me.  I  may  be  now,  though  heaven 
knows  what  other  woman  mayn't  come  wrig- 
gling in  .  .  ."  And  just  at  that  moment  Miss 
Jenkins  came  into  the  major's  room  carrying 
his  kit-bag.  And  because  Mrs.  Foster  felt  that 
things  were  entirely  at  a  deadlock  between  her- 
self and  her  husband,  since  they  were  each 
accusing  the  other  with  words  of  the  utmost 
veracity  and  sincereness,  Mrs.  Foster  turned 
upon  Miss  Jenkins  and  said: 

"Now,  Miss  Jenkins,  my  dear,  perhaps  you 
will  kindly  tell  Mr.  Foster  who  is  the  real  mis- 
tress of  this  house.  I  know  I  sit  at  the  head  of 
the  table,  and  I  know  the  servants  call  me 
*ma'am';  but  who,  for  instance,  has  had  the 
arranging  of  the  bedrooms?  Who  is  really  re- 
sponsible for  these  extraordinary  scenes?  For 
that's  the  person  who  is  the  real  mistress  of 
the  house." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  333 

Miss  Jenkins  looked  quite  softly  at  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter. "Well,  if  you  ask  me,  ma'am,"  she  said, 
*'l  should  just  simply  say  that  I  think  I  am." 

She  added,  looking  down  at  the  kit-bag  that 
she  still  held:  "You  see,  I  am  arranging  it 
even  now." 

"Then  perhaps,"  Mr.  Foster  exclaimed  quite 
confidently,  "you  will  kindly  explain  what  the 
whole  of  this  confounded  business  has  really 
meant." 

"I  am  sure,"  Miss  Jenkins  said,  "that  I  am 
perfectly  ready  to  explain  everything,  and  to 
take  every  possible  kind  of  responsibility.  And 
I  am  perfectly  ready  to  begin  by  saying  that 
everybody  in  the  house  is  entirely  innocent  of 
any  kind  of  guilt — except  Miss  Peabody,  whose 
motor  has  just  gone  tearing  down  the  avenue. 
If  it  hadn't,  I  should  not  be  quite  so  ready  to 
explain.  But  she's  safely  out  of  it,  and  we're 
all  safely  out  of  it.  So  that  I  can  quite  well 
say  that  even  she  has  not  been  guilty  of  any- 
thing except  simple  spite." 

"You  don't  expect  me  to  believe  that!'*  Mrs. 
Foster  said. 

"I  do,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  answered.  "I 
expect  you  to  believe  every  word  that  I  say. 
For  if  I've  said  that  I've  been  responsible  for 
all  this  arrangement,  I  certainly  expect  it  to  be 


334  RING  FOR  NANCY 

believed  that  I  was  not  aiding  and  abetting 
Miss  Peabody  or  anybody  else  to  do  anything 
that  could  be  called  immoral." 

"Well,  I  think  I  will  allow  that,"  Mrs.  Fos- 
ter said. 

"I  think  you  will  have  to,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jen- 
kins answered.  "I'm  not  going  to  say  that  Miss 
Peabody  didn't  insist  on  being  transferred  to 
this  room;  because  she  did.  She  didn't  do  it 
with  any  view  to  midnight  interviews  with  Mr. 
Foster.  And  Mr.  Foster  could  not  possibly 
have  had  any  idea  of  midnight  interviews  with 
Miss  Peabody,  because  he  hadn't  the  slightest 
idea  in  any  manner  of  speaking  of  where  he 
really  was.  He  was  just  planked  down  in  a 
room  he  didn't  know.  So  that  clears  him.  And 
I  don't  really  suppose  that  he  in  the  least 
wanted  any  midnight  conversation  with  Miss 
Peabody  because,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  I  know 
pretty  well  that  he  was  just  hiding  in  his  bed- 
room in  order  to  get  away  from  Miss  Pea- 
body." 

"Why  should  he  want  to  get  away  from  Miss 
Peabody?'*  Mrs.  Foster  asked. 

"Well,  just  because,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins 
answered,  "because  he  signed  the  contract  for 
the  new  theater  with  Miss  Delamare  this  eve- 
ning after  dinner." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  335 

Mrs.  Foster  said,  "Oh  I" 

"So  that  you  can  understand,"  Miss  Jenkins 
continued,  "that  Mr.  Foster  was  not  particular- 
ly anxious  to  have  an  interview  with  the  lady. 
And  I  dare  say  you  can  understand  that  Miss 
Peabody  was  anxious  to  have  an  interview  with 
Miss  Delamare.  That  was  why  she  insisted 
upon  having  this  bedroom.  That  is  why  we're 
all — all  of  us — feehng  perceptibly  happier." 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  at  Miss  Jenkins.  "What 
a  way  you  have  of  understanding  things,  Miss 
Jenkins,  my  dear,"  she  said.  "For  it's  perfectly 
true  that  we're  all  of  us  ever  so  much  happier. 
I  think  I  was  heart-broken,  but  the  minute  that 
woman  went  out  of  the  room  I  knew  I  was 
standing  on  what  some  poet  called  his  native 
heath,  though,  of  course,  this  isn't  really  my 
own  house." 

"Oh,  well,  for  all  practical  purposes,"  Miss 
Jenkins  said,  "you  can  consider  it  absolutely 
your  own  house." 

"But  I  never  shall  really,"  Mrs.  Foster  an- 
swered.    "Not  really  quite  absolutely." 

"I  wouldn't  make  too  certain  of  that,  ma'am," 
Miss  Jenkins  said. 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  at  her  with  bewildered 
eyes  that  gradually  widened  and  widened.  And 
then    she    asked    as    a    certain    enhghtenment 


336     ^  RING  FOR  NANCY 

seemed  to  pass  across  her  mild  and  simple 
features : 

"You  really  think  you  can  manage  that?" 

"I  really  mean,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  said, 
"that  I  wouldn't  be  too  certain  that  I  couldn't 
— and  that  you  could  be  perfectly  and  abso- 
lutely certain  that  if  I  could,  you  would,  in  a 
manner  of  speaking,  be  standing  on  your  native 
heath." 

"I  don't  understand  what  this  is  all  about," 
Mr.  Foster  said.  "But  women  are  always  in- 
comprehensible, so  it  doesn't  matter.  I  want 
to  know  if  there  is  any  charge  hanging  over 
my  head." 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  at  Miss  Jenkins.  "Then 
this,"  she  said,  "is  really  the  happiest  day  of 
my  life.  For  even  Mr.  Foster,  for  the  first  time 
since  I've  known  him,  has  really  behaved  like 
a  man,  and  you  can't  imagine  what  an  immense 
satisfaction  that  is  to  me.  For  he  has  just  said, 
*Damn  it!'  quite  loud  and  strong,  and  he  has 
just  stood  up  to  me  as  if  he  hadn't  got  a  back- 
bone that  was  made  of  india-rubber.  .  .  .  Yes, 
yes,  for  the  very  first  time !  For,  for  the  whole 
of  his  life  he  has  been  cringing  before  me  be- 
cause he  has  been  afraid  that  I  should  find  out 
about  some  red-haired  shop-girl  out  of  a  glass 
case,  and  I  have  known  all  the  time,  especially 


RING  FOR  NANCY  Z2>7 

when  he  came  home  with  the  whiskers  that  he 
used  to  wear  damaged  and  bedraggled.  And 
I've  known  and  I  haven't  cared,  and  I've  been 
so  ashamed  of  not  having  cared  that  I  haven't 
dared  to  tell  him  for  fear  he  should  tell  me 
that  I  was  immoral.  And  now  it's  all  come 
out,  and  he  has  really  stood  up  and  spoken  like 
a  man;  and  that  alone  is  enough  to  make  me 
happier  than  I've  ever  been  since  my  wedding- 
day.     And  if  only  my  Edward  were  here  .  .  ." 

*'0h,"  Miss  Jenkins  said,  "I  told  him  to  wait 
outside  the  door  till  I  said  he  could  come  in^ 
He's  there  quite  all  right.  But  I  thought  it 
was  not  quite  fitting  that  he  should  hear  the 
delicate  things  I  knew  we  should  have  to  dis- 
cuss." 

"But  we've  really  discussed  everything,  Miss 
Jenkins,  my  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "and  I 
don't  think  he  should  be  kept  outside  the  door 
any  longer  than  is  absolutely  necessary,  for 
these  corridors  are  cold  and  draughty  and  nasty 
and  anxious  sort  of  places,  and  it's  all  so  cleared 
up,  and  there  are  such  tremendous  weights  ofif 
my  mind;  so  that  I  think  we  ought  to  let  my 
dear  Edward  come  in  and  tell  him  that  I  am 
going  to  have  him  too  all  to  myself  for  the  rest 
of  the  time." 

"I  should  not  be  too  certain  of  that,  ma'am," 


338  RING  FOR  NANCY 

Miss  Jenkins  said  softly.  "And  I  should  not  be 
too  certain  that  we've  discussed  all  the  delicate 
things  that  we've  got  to  discuss,  because  I 
want  a  little  direction  from  you  on  that  very 
subject."  i 

"What    very    subject?"    Mr.    Foster    asked. 

But  Mrs.  Foster  continued  composedly: 
"The  only  thing  that  I  stipulate  is  that  the 
next  one  he  chooses  shan't  be  an  old  maid  with 
a  skin  like  lawyers'  parchment,  and  a  temper 
like  what  Lucifer  is  said  to  have,  though  I 
don't  believe  his  can  be  really  as  bad." 

"I  don't  think,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  said, 
"that  she  will  be  that.  Though,  of  course,  it 
isn't  for  me  to  say.  But  perhaps,  ma'am,  if 
you  tell  me  just  exactly  what  it  is  you  want,  I 
might  be  able  to  provide  you  with  something 
that  would  come  up  to  sample.  For  you  must 
remember,  ma'am,  that  you  promised  me  four 
thousand  pounds,  and  that  I  might  have  the 
major  for  myself  if  I  got  that  woman  out  of 
the  house.  And  I  have  got  that  woman  out  of 
the  house,  as  every  one  will  clearly  acknowl- 
edge. So  that  if  you  don't  feel  inclined  to 
keep  your  promise — though  as  for  the  four 
thousand  pounds  I  don't  want  it — I  should 
just  like  to  know  what  it  is  that  exactly  you 
do  want — what  it  is  that  would  suit  you  ex- 
actly  and   absolutely   down   to   the   ground." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  339 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  almost  piteously  at  Miss 
Jenkins.  She  was  really  in  a  most  extraordinary 
state  of  mind. 

"Miss  Jenkins,  my  dear,"  she  said,  "I  have 
always  felt  that  you  were  one  of  the  family.  I 
have  felt  from  the  very  first  moment  I  came 
here — and  w^ith  no  disloyalty  to  Flossie,  for 
that's  quite  another  sort  of  thing,  and  she 
doesn't  strike  me  as  being  so  much  a  woman 
as  a  child — that  you  were  the  very  nicest 
w^oman  I  have  ever  met,  and — that  if  you  had 
certain  other  things  which  you  don't  appear  to 
have — but  you're  so  extraordinary  that  there's 
no  knowing  what  you  have  or  haven't,  or 
might  have,  or  mightn't  have — that  it  would 
make  me  the  very  happiest  woman  in  the  world 
if  you  married  my  Edward.  For  you  are  capa- 
ble and  sensible,  and  more  handsome  than  any- 
body I  have  ever  seen,  and  good-tempered  and 
disciplined.  I  can  tell  that  because  you  have 
such  an  excellent  quiet  way  of  being  a  servant, 
and  you're  high-spirited,  and  you  like  your  fun, 
and  you  can  make  any  one  in  the  world  fond  of 
you  .  .  ." 

"I  think,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  interrupted 
her,  "that  I  know  quite  well  what  I  am,  but  I 
should  just  like  you  to  tell  me  what  you  want 
me  to  have." 

Mrs.  Foster  looked  at  Miss  Jenkins  with  the 


340  RING  FOR  NANCY  | 

expression  of  a  child  who  gazes  into  the  fire  in 
search  of  fairy  palaces. 

**I  don't  quite  exactly  know,"  she  said.  "It 
isn't  what  I  want  her  to  have  so  much,  for  I 
almost  hope  she  won't  have  much  money  so 
that  he  can't  be  said  to  be  dependent  on  her; 
but  I  hope  she  will  be  of  good  family,  because 
he's  of  good  family  himself,  his  father,  the  ad- 
miral, being  descended,  as  I  have  heard  him 
say  many  times,  from  the  old  ancient  kings  of 
Ireland,  and  moving  in  the  society  of  the  best 
in  the  land.  And  I  wouldn't  object  to  her  hav- 
ing a  title,  because  that's  a  nice  thing,  too, 
though  heaven  knows  I've  never  wanted  it 
myself.  A  title — and  a  house  like  this — and  a 
little  estate  like  this — but  not  too  big  .  .  ." 

"Of  course,  ma'am,"  Miss  Jenkins  said, 
"you're  talking  about  Lady  Savylle.  Well,  I 
don't  see  any  difficulty  about  that,  ma'am." 

Mrs.  Foster  had  come  altogether  too  near  it 
already  to  start  now.    And  she  just  said : 

"You  mean  that  Lady — Lady  Savylle  would 
marry  him.^" 

"I'm  perfectly  certain  she  will,  ma'am,"  Miss 
Jenkins  said,  "the  moment  he  asks  her." 

"But  he  loves  her,"  Mrs.  Foster  said.  "He 
loves  her  most  devotedly." 

"I  believe  he  does,  ma'am." 


RING  FOR  NANCY  341 

It  was  at  that  moment  that  Mr.  Foster  saw 
something  confident  and  man-like  to  say,  and 
he  remarked: 

"If  Edward  doesn't  propose  to  Lady  Savylle 
to-morrow,  I  shall  cut  him  straight  out  of  my 
will." 

And  it  was  really  his  turn  to  be  surprised 
when  Miss  Jenkins  remarked: 

"I  should  not,  if  I  were  you,  be  too  aston- 
ished if  he  did  it  to-night." 

"But  surely,"  Mr.  Foster  said,  "it's  too  late. 
You  don't  expect  him  to  get  on  a  horse  and  go 
galloping  ...  I  mean,  I  shouldn't  like  it  my- 
self.    His  eyes  have  got  to  be  considered." 

Miss  Jenkins  remarked:  "Then  if  all  that  has 
got  to  be  considered,  and  if  you  really  think  it 
is  gefting  near  the  statutory  hour  for  barring 
proposals  of  marriage,  don't  you  think  it  would 
make  it  come  a  little  earlier  if  you  went  into 
the  next  room  and  I  closed  the  panel — you  and 
Mrs.  Foster — for  the  major  is  waiting  outside 
with  a  portmanteau  on  his  back,  and  the  sooner 
I  have  a  word  with  him  the  sooner  all  this  will 
be  settled  to  everybody's  satisfaction." 

The  grim  men  and  the  vacant  women 
marched  across  the  old  couple  as  they  went 
into  the  pink  room,  and  Miss  Jenkins,  closed 
in  and  up  against  it,  stood  with  her  hand  still 


342  RING  FOR  NANCY 

upon  the  knob.  She  was  undoubtedly  pantmg 
shghtly,  and  she  looked  at  the  little  secret  door 
of  escape  that  was  only  half  hidden  by  the 
shadowy  arras.  The  electric  light  had  never 
got  itself  repaired,  so  that  she  and  the  room 
and  the  great  picture  and  the  great  bed  were 
only  shadowily  lit  by  the  pair  of  long  wax 
candles  on  the  dressing-table.  But  she  aban- 
doned her  impulse  of  flight  and  called: 

"Now  you  can  come  in,  Major  Edward." 

The  major  pushed  the  door  open  with  the 
portmanteau  that  was  upon  his  shoulder,  but 
that  was  the  last  use  that  he  made  of  it,  for 
he  pitched  it  straight  on  to  the  ground,  and 
rushing  forward  with  extended  arms,  he  grasped 
Miss  Jenkins  and  kissed  her  repeatedly  upon 
every  one  of  her  features  that  his  lips  could 
be   expected   to   reach. 

*TVe  brought  it  off  at  last,"  he  gasped.  "IVe 
kissed  somebody  at  last." 

Miss  Jenkins  with  quite  a  firm  grasp  removed 
his  hands  from  her  shoulders. 

"And  don't  you  think  it  is  very  wrong  of 
you,  sir?"  she  asked. 

"I'm  hanged  if  I  do,"  the  major  said.  "Fm 
not  engaged  to  Olympia  now." 

"But  you  are  in  love  with  her  ladyship," 
Miss  Jenkins  answered 


The  major  grasped  Miss  Jenkins  and  kissed  her  repeatedly 


RING  FOR  NANCY  343 

"I  am  in  love  with  you,  with  you,  with 
you,"  the  major  said. 

"But  you  have  got  to  marry  Lady  Savylle,*' 
Miss  Jenkins  asserted.  "Your  uncle  says  he 
will  cut  you  out  of  his  will  if  you  don't  propose 
to  her  to-morrow." 

"I  am  proposing  to  you  to-night,"  Major 
Foster  said.     "Will  you  marry  me?" 

"But  you  have  got  to  marry  money  or  a 
title,  sir,"  she  informed  him.  "One  or  the 
other." 

"I  don't  care,"  he  answered.  "YouVe  got  to 
marry  me." 

"A  poor  servant,  sir?"  Miss  Jenkins  said. 
"You'll  be  cut  out  of  your  uncle's  will." 

"I  don't  care,"  he  exclaimed.     "I'll  work." 

"You  couldn't,  sir,"  she  said.  "You'll  have 
to  leave  the  army  altogether  if  you  marry  a 
servant.     You'll  have  to  live  on  my  wages." 

"Oh,  they'll  do  for  two,"  the  major  answered. 
"I'll  come  as  butler." 

Miss  Jenkins  was  searching  on  his  dressing- 
table.  "You  haven't  got  a  piece  of  paper?"  she 
asked. 

He  produced  from  his  kit-bag  a  complete 
sheet  of  note-paper.  "What  do  you  want  paper 
for?"  he  asked. 

"To  write  upon,  sir,"  she  answered. 


344  RING  FOR  NANCY 

"Well,  you  can  have  half  the  sheet,"  he  said, 
and  he  tore  it  in  half.  "You  want  to  make  me 
sign  a  promise  to  marry  you ;  then  I  shall  make 
you  sign  a  promise  to  marry  me.  You're  a 
wicked,  cunning,  intricate  and  slippery  eel,  and 
you  are  not  going  to  get  out  of  it."  He  lent 
her  a  fountain-pen  from  his  traveling  desk,  and 
she  wrote  a  very  short  message  that  could  not 
have  been  more  than  three  words  by  the 
scratching  of  the  pen.  She  folded  the  sheet  of 
paper  carefully,  and  then  regarded  him  with  a 
sort  of  humorous  intentness. 

"You're  determined  to  marry  me,  sir?"  she 
said.  "It  does  seem  a  pity  when  we  had  it  all 
so  nicely  arranged,  your  uncle,  your  aunt  and 
I.  You  were  to  marry  some  one  with  a  title 
and  a  little  house  like  this,  and  a  little  estate 
like  this." 

"I  am  going — to  marry — you,"  the  major 
said. 

She  held  the  paper  toward  him.  "Then  you 
had  better  read  this  when  I  am  gone,"  she  said. 

"Here,  you  wait  a  minute,"  he  commanded 
cheerfully.  "I  can  do  a  Httle  bit  of  writing, 
too;  give  me  my  pen." 

He  scribbled  four  words  upon  his  piece  of 
paper,  folded  it  and  held  it  out  toward  her. 
"Turn    about's    fair    trading,"    he    said.      "You 


RING  FOR  NANCY  345 

give  me  your  paper,  and  you  may  have  mine; 
but  you're  to  read  yours  here  and  I  will  read 
mine." 

She  looked  at  him  with  an  odd  smile,  and 
he  said: 

"Well,  this  is  what  we  call  the  game  of  con- 
sequences. You've  just  got  to  bear  them. 
Open  your  paper." 

"No,  open  yours  first,"  she  said.     . 

He  remarked,  "Oh,  well  .  .  ."  And  then  he 
read.  "Oh,  is  that  all?"  he  exclaimed  non- 
chalantly. 

"All.^"   she  ejaculated. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "if  you  look  at  your  paper 
you  will  see  that  there  is  only  one  word  in  each 
of  them  that  differs.  You've  written,  'I'm 
Mary  Savylle,'  and  I've  written,  ^You're  Mary 
Savylle.'  It  seems  a  silly  thing  to  have  done, 
but  it's  what  you  wanted,  and  I  suppose  it's  my 
job  in  life  to  give  you  what  you  want." 

"Then  you  knew  all  the  time?"  she  said. 

"All  the  blessed,  blessed  time,"  he  answered. 
"Don't  suppose  that  though  the  eyes  in  my 
head  are  damaged  they  didn't  know  you  from 
the  start,  though  you  puzzled  me?  And  don't 
you  suppose  it  has  been  a  blessed,  blessed  time 
just  being  in  the  same  house  with  you,  and  just 
having  you  fluttering  round,  and  just  knowing 


346  RING  FOR  NANCY 

and  just  loving  and  just  wondering — ^just  won- 
dering what  you  were  going  to  do  ?  And  wasn't 
it  just  the  blessing  of  God  only  to  sit  in  this 
room  and  to  know  it  was  full  of  you  where  you 
had  been  walking  round  and  round  so  that  the 
trace  of  your  footsteps  interlaced,  and  every  bit 
of  the  air  in  which  must  have  touched  you  and 
kissed  you?    And  don't  you  suppose  ..." 

"Oh,  you  Irish  villain !"  she  exclaimed. 

"Oh,  you  wicked  designing  witch!"  he  an- 
swered.    "How  did  you  dare  to  do  it?" 

"Do  you  suppose,"  she  mimicked  him,  "that 
I  could  bear  you  to  be  in  England  a  minute  and 
me  knowing  it  and  not  being  with  you  every 
second  of  the  time?  And  don't  you  suppose  I 
have  passed  every  minute  of  the  time  that  I 
could  spare  from  these  botherations  just  being 
in  this  room  when  you  were  not  in  it,  and  just 
looking  at  the  cold  ashes  of  the  wood  and  just 
thinking  how  they  had  glowed  when  you  looked 
upon  them?  And  haven't  you  been  the  sun  in 
the  air  to  me,  and  the  sky  that  carries  it  all,  and 
the  green  of  the  grass,  and  the  love  that  is  in 
all  the  world?  And  don't  you  suppose  that 
when  I  have  laughed  at  you  I  have  trembled 
too,  because  I  knew  it  was  you  who  was  the 
master  of  me?  And  don't  you  suppose  .  .  ." 
And  she  put  her  hands  upon  his  shoulders  and 


RING  FOR  NANCY  347 

drew  him  close  against  her.  "Don't  you  sup- 
pose .  .  ." 

"What  a  .  .  ."  he  was  beginning,  when  again 
she  interrupted  him  with: 

"Now,  my  wild  Irishman,  don't  you  be  saying 
that  I  am  anything,  and  I  won't  be  giving  you 
any  title.  But  just  let's  remember  that  it's  not 
you,  and  it's  not  me,  but  it's  just  us  from  now 
on  to  the  end  of  time,  and  just  say  what's  fit 
for  both  our  mouths  .  .  .  and  that's  what  a 
pair  of  us  we  are!" 

"What  a  pair  of  us  we  are!"  he  repeated  en- 
thusiastically. And  just  at  that  moment  there 
was  not  any  panel  there  at  all,  and  Mrs.  Foster 
was  remarking: 

"Teddy,  there's  a  knob  on  this  side  of  the 
panel  as  well  as  on  that;  we've  just  found  it." 
She  surveyed  contentedly  the  couple  who  were 
disengaging  themselves  from  each  other's  arms, 
and  she  remarked:  "Ah!" 

"So  that,"  Miss  Jenkins  said,  "you  really 
expected  this  all  the  time." 

"I  certainly  really  suspected  something  of  the 
sort  from  the  very  beginning,"  Mrs.  Foster 
said.  "From  the  first  moment  that  I  set  eyes 
on — on  her  ladyship's  own  maid." 

"Oh,  you  wicked  old  person!"  Miss  Jenkins 
said. 


348  RING  FOR  NANCYi 

"My  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  replied,  "the  first 
thing  I  learned  in  my  life  from  Edward's  father, 
the  admiral,  was  that  it's  best  to  let  young 
people  alone.  For  he  nearly  bit  my  head  off 
when  I  tried  to  give  Edward's  mother  good 
advice  during  their  courting.  And  a  very  rash 
and  sudden  thing  it  was,  for  it  only  lasted  three 
days  from  the  time  when  he  came  into  the 
shop  to  order  twenty  pounds  of  wax  candles  for 
the  captain's  cabin,  because  things  were  differ- 
ent in  those  days.  And  I  think  you  will  ac- 
knowledge that  I  have  let  you  alone  ...  I 
think  you  will  acknowledge  that  I  have  done 
my  best  for  my  dear  Edward.  And  if  a  woman 
really  sets  herself  to  do  her  best,  there's  not 
anything  in  this  silly  world  that  is  going  to 
prevent  her  doing  it." 

"But  hang  it  all!"  Mr.  Foster  said,  reassert- 
ing after  the  manner  of  men  his  masculine  dig- 
nity. "I  refuse  not  to  be  credited  with  my 
share  of  perspicacity.  Your  brother-in-law  was 
undoubtedly  a  most  distinguished  officer,  I  am 
informed  that  his  cutting  our  affair  with  the 
boats  on  the  Kowloon  River  in  the  China  War 
of  I  forget  the  date  .  .  ." 

"My  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "I'm  sure  we 
are  most  of  us  anxious  to  get  to  bed." 

".  .  .  was  a  most  spirited  action."     Mr.  Foster 


RING  FOR  NANCY  349 

continued  his  speech,  "and  at  the  first  available 
sitting  of  the  Common  Council  I  shall  move  that 
a  fitting  memorial  be  erected,  either  in  St. 
Paul's  Cathedral  or  elsev^here  in  the  city  to 
the  memory  of  one  who  w^as  not  only  a  gallant 
defender  of  his  country  but  w^hat  I  may  call 
the  founder  of  a  family  v^hich  will  long  adorn 
our   native   annals." 

"My  dear,"  Mrs.  Foster  said,  "you  go  a 
little  too   far  if  you  go  any  further." 

"If  you  w^ould  only,"  Mr.  Foster  retorted, 
"let  me  speak  as  I  want  to  speak  without  dis- 
tracting me  as  you  might  say  with  red  herrings, 
I  want  to  point  out  that  I,  too,  certainly  did 
suspect  something.  For  I  remember  distinctly 
that  that  morning  at  breakfast  when  her  lady- 
ship handed  me  the  sausages,  or  it  may  have 
been  fried  soles,  for  I  can  not  at  this  distance 
of  time  be  expected  to  remember  a  detail  so 
small  .  .  .  and  it  can  hardly  be  imagined  that 
a  man  with  my  knowledge  of  the  world  and 
one  who  has  built  up  so  considerable  a  business 
beginning  from  nothing  .  .  .  But  what  I  wanted 
to  say  was  that  I  distinctly  remember  calling 
her  ladyship  *Nancy,  my  dear,'  which  I  cer- 
tainly should  not  have  done  if  I  hadn't  sus- 
pected something." 

"My  dear,"   Mrs.   Foster  said,  "if  you  want 


350  RING  FOR  NANCY 

to  accuse  yourself  of  making  eyes  at  the  house- 
maid, I'm  perfectly  ready  to  beheve  it.  But 
when  it  comes  to  suspecting  things  I'm  sure 
we  are  all  a  great  deal  too  ready  to  do  that. 
But,  on  the  other  hand  when  I  come  to  think 
of  it,  if  it  hadn't  been  for  suspicions,  I  suppose 
we  shouldn't  any  of  us  have  been  here  in  this 
particular  situation,  so  that  in  a  manner  of 
speaking,  we  may  say  that  perhaps  it's  suspi- 
cions that  make  the  world  go  round." 

"And  topsy-turvy  and  upside  down  and  in- 
and-out  and  in  every  possible  kind  of  a  happy 
blessed  way,"  the  major  said,  "for  that's  the 
way  it's  gone  with  me." 


THE  END 


53V 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

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